


Fears of the Future （未来の恐怖もの）

by MonochroMayhem



Series: Resounding Echoes AU [2]
Category: Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comic), Sonic the Hedgehog (Video Games), Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: Emotional, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Dynamics, Five Stages of Grief, Gen, Immortality, Original Character(s), Originally Posted on deviantART, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Semi-Canonical Character, Size Difference, Trans Character, Trans Female Character, anticipatory grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 58,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25238074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonochroMayhem/pseuds/MonochroMayhem
Summary: When a spiritual force in the form of an ancient moon spirit threatens to awaken, a young sagely child calls upon the powers of the universe to send her a champion to stop the evil force. Team Sonic and Dark team up once again for another adventure as Bastette learns an ugly truth about her sister.
Series: Resounding Echoes AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1827637
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	1. Call to Adventure!

It was a lazy autumn evening when dusk fell over Kingdom Valley. The gentle breeze kissed the top of a young moth’s wings and sounded down into the cave she’d entered. Her sandals gently touched down as she landed inside and listened to the waterfall that flowed in front of her, its rapid sloshing accentuated by thick clusters of luminescent blue mushrooms glowing through the path.

She gingerly pulled her skirt away, revealing a pair of shorts that hugged her legs down to the point right below her knee. The skirt went from a round garment to a flat one, and the moth gently draped it over her wings as she walked closer to the waterfall. The mist from the spray already was condensing on her fluffy antennae and she sneezed a bit in a nervous response.

“Never going to get used to that,” she said to herself. The glow that naturally came from her body turned yellow the instant she sneezed and settled back into its usual mint green.

As she passed under the waterfall, her ‘cloak’ became soaked. Thankfully it served its purpose and left her wings dry, but it would take a moment before the sarong itself would be dry again. She walked to a nearby stalagmite and tossed it over the dulled point of the formation, careful not to damage the intricate stitching.

Her eyes fell upon the blue pool of water that illuminated itself in the center of the room. It was circular, like a strange sort of baptismal font, but it was old and warm and didn’t appear to be seeing much use. She had been the only one using it these last few months, and that was because she had recently had a vision.

As she stared into the pool, she recalled it over and over in her mind. It was impossible to purge the vision from herself- a tundra with no end in sight, trees and people frozen over and lifeless like statues, the sky in limbo from the icy cold touch of death.

But why her? And why now? It was a moment of prosperity across the world at the moment. No crazy schemers attempting to take the lives of innocents with a weapon in space were anywhere in sight. The world was at a refreshing standstill and the moth finally felt at peace, or at least she tried to.

Little voices, the size of pinheads, pricked her waking self and yearned for her attention. She could communicate with the dead and know their past, and no matter where she would go, she’d be reminded of this uncanny ability. When she met with someone new, they’d inevitably be driven away by her powers. A cycle of a curse, echoed over and over again.

She carefully unlaced her sandals and set them aside as she slipped her feet into the cold water. The strands of pond lily root swirled about her big toe, and as she watched, the vision came again.

A scream, a shout like a banshee so loud the moth could have easily gone deaf if it were real. A shining gem of blue, a Vesica Picis, stood in the center of a silhouette with an upturned head, blinking and producing a shockwave. A cold chill streaks white across a blackened sky.

A family crumbles beneath a building, held up for an instant too short.

The moth came back and stared into the pool. “Is this what is to become of our world?” she wondered aloud.

She looked up past the pool to a carving in the rock wall. There upon its face stood a figure looming over the Earth as though to devour it, arms open wide with a grim approach to embrace the planet. It’s sorrowful gaze left it in tears. Above its head stood a moon shining light downwards.

“Luneria…” she whispered. Her aura turned white.

The moth looked back into the pool. “I have to call for help,” she said frantically. “Someone has to be able to know how to seal this away.”

She pulled herself into the pool and waded until she reached the center, where she could barely touch and keep her head above water. The wet soak of her green wings gave her shivers, and yet she pushed the disgusting feeling aside for the sake of fulfilling her duty.

“Seven lights of the Earth,” she said. “The slumber of Luneria is finally ending. We must quell its bitter wrath before it’s too late!”

A series of carvings in the rock surrounding the pool began to glow like hot coals. The moth looked about, stunned as she’d never seen the place act in such a way. Her aura turned a bright teal, and she could feel pins and needles in her extremities.

She bit her lip and squeezed her eyes shut, doing her best to ride the strange feelings in her fingers and toes. “Please! I, Nyx, implore you to grant my request!”

All the pressure came to her head as she yelled. “Send me a champion!” she shouted, tossing her arms into the air. Her aura lit up the walls, touching every crevice and leaving it with a slight afterglow.

And in an instant, the glowing carvings died down, and she was left standing in the middle of the blue pool. Nyx was alone, disheartened and- worst of all- very very afraid.

“It didn’t work,” she breathed. The moth clutched her chest. “It didn’t work…”

She quickly pulled herself out of the pool and rapidly shook her wings to dry them as she ran, still barefoot, out the way she came in. She grabbed her cloak and guarded her wings as she went past the waterfall, out of the cave, and out into the open breeze of the valley.

She sat down at the lip of the cliff outside the entrance and stared at her hands. Whatever she’d done, it wasn’t enough.

It never was.

She clenched her fist, dragging her fingers through the dirt and leaving indents in their path. She was never enough. She wasn’t enough to protect the Shrines, she wasn’t enough to be the successor of her own colony’s monarchy, and she wasn’t enough to be anything more than a child to her own family.

She was only 9, yet she had all these duties. She was only 9, and she already felt like she was an adult. She was only nine, but despite her massive pressures she was never treated like an adult.

She was only 9.

A hot tear trickled down the side of her face. “I didn’t ask to have this gift. If I can’t do what I was made for, then…”

She placed both of her hands against her face and sobbed. Her aura turned a bright blue and cloaked the world within 20 feet of her with its hue.

Unbeknownst to her, however, the pool’s carvings were lighting up again, and the water was beginning to boil.

* * *

Silver pursed his lips. “Professor, are how many of these am I gonna have to close before the job’s done?” he asked. He was tapping his foot as his friend, Professor Von Schlemmer, worked out the bugs in his pet project.

For the past week now, the world had grown quiet. The Genesis Portals, interdimensional rifts in time and space, had been showing up for months before, but there was nothing now. Silver was unsure if that was a good or bad thing, but his instincts kept him on edge. Usually Murphy’s Law would have kicked in by now, knowing how he seemed to be a magnet for trouble.

“Vell, ve haven’t seen vone in a vhile, so I suppose zat zhere shouldn’t be very many more…” the Professor replied. He was tweaking on of the wires of a small display. “Zhen again, I have been wrong before… several times, now that I recall it correctly.”

Silver crossed his arms. “We can’t just stand around and wait for danger to come to us,” the hedgehog replied. He turned. “Gold, what do you think?”

Gold, a tenrec who had recently been relieved of her duties as a Council Member, nervously played with one of her quills. “Well,” she quietly spoke. “Onyx City hasn’t been under attack in at least a week. Perhaps we’ve earned a break.”

Silver rolled his eyes. He had no idea what was wrong with the two of them. They should be working to get all of the Genesis Portals closed. He tensed up.

Gold put a hand on his shoulder and glowed a bit, sending a thought to Silver. _Relax_ _,_ she said, _you’ve been at this for a week straight, don’t you think you need a vacation?_

Silver sighed. _Gold, you know I don’t like when you invade my thoughts, he replied internally. It’s a breach of privacy._

Gold backed off and turned to Von Schlemmer. “What’s that you’re working on?”

“Vas vorking,” the scientist replied. “It’s done now.” He turned around, showing the team a trio of bracelets. “Introducing, zhe Interdimensional Telecommunications Handheld!”

“ITCH? Really?” Silver asked. “And wouldn’t it be wrist-held?”

“I couldn’t resist zhe name,” the professor replied. “If you’re out on a mission, your communication shouldn’t get cut, barring extreme circumstances of course.” He offered one to each of them.

Silver undid the clasp and stuck it on above his glowing glove cuffs. “Thanks, I suppose this would come in handy, though if there aren’t any portals, I don’t think that it would be of much use right now.”

“Vhy don’t you go and test it out in the City? I could use some new parts for the Bits.”

The Bits, a trio of learning sentient hedgehog-shaped tiny robots, chirped out binary at him. Red was particularly vocal today, but Silver wasn’t having any of it.

Silver paused, and looked at Gold, who’d also attached her bracelet. “Gold, could you come with me? I… could use some company.”

The tenrec nodded and followed Silver out the exit from the lab. “Don’t worry Professor, we’ll be back.”

The two of them walked a safe distance from the lab before the hedgehog broke the silence. “Gold, I don’t get why he’s so eager to wait for another one to open,” he said. “It makes us look like sitting ducks.”

“I think you’ve been fighting too much lately, Silver,” she said quietly. “Maybe the stress is getting to your head.”

Silver frowned. “But I want to keep our world safe. What if it falls into ruin? I don’t want my home destroyed by some unforeseen disaster. I don't want to take that risk. You _know_ that."

Gold sighed and stopped.

Silver stopped and turned to face her. ”Gold?” he asked.

“I know you get worked up about your friends getting messed up by the world falling apart. But we’re fine right now and that’s all we can control.” She looked down to the pavement. “Besides, you’ve been getting better at closing the portals.”

Silver looked at his hands. “It still takes a lot of effort on my part.”

As the two rounded the corner to the parts shop, Silver’s breath hitched. He felt something strange in the air. It wasn’t the feeling of a Genesis Portal opening nearby, but it was something very very similar. Down the alley, he spotted it- a red portal opening towards a blue light.

“What’s that doing here?” Gold asked. “It certainly doesn’t look like a Genesis Portal…”

Silver was already trying to close it. His hands glowed teal as he struggled to use his powers. He bit his lip and tried to close the gap with both arms. Then, in a moment, he broke, panting hard and attempting to catch a breath. “Ugh, it won’t budge. Let me move closer.”

As he did, he held down the button on his ITCH device and spoke. “Professor, we have a strange portal outside the parts store. It isn’t a Genesis Portal, but it looks like it still goes somewhere.”

“Vell zhen, perhaps zhis is zhe opportunity you’re looking for,” he replied. “Plus, you can test out zhe device.”

Silver looked at Gold. She smiled. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll keep the professor out of trouble,” she said.

“What about the Genesis portals? Who will close them if--”

“Just go. There’s probably a reason it opened like it did. If something on the other side of it called it there, it’s possible you’re exactly what they’re looking for.”

Silver awkwardly shuffled. “Are you absolutely sure?” he asked. “Because I can’t imagine leaving you and the professor here alone and unguarded.”

Gold nodded. “You have a right to be worried. But you also should be worried about this portal here opening. Someone needs your help, and you can’t just ignore them.”

Silver sighed. “Alright, just be careful,” he said. “I… I don’t wanna lose you.”

Gold blushed a little. “O-Okay.”

Silver breathed in as he leapt through the portal, and all at once, everything went white for an instant, and then he felt himself breaching the surface of a burning pool of water.

* * *

Silver gasped for air and shouted. “Hot, hot!” he yelled, swimming to the edge of the water and frantically pulling himself up onto the side. He flopped over onto his back and felt the cool stone floor against his back, and he hummed a bit as he took in his surroundings.

“Now where did I end up?” he thought aloud. He sat up and looked about before his eyes settled on a mural carving. It was a beast engulfing the world, and its eyes were empty and full of wroth. The sockets were empty, yet so expressive still.

Silver stood up and walked towards it, and as he came to a stop at the mural his index finger gently traced the sockets. The gravelly texture of the rough wall crackled ever-so-slightly beneath the fibers of his glove. He swallowed hard, wondering if this was why he was called; this… thing.

A cry sounded from far outside the cavern, and Silver quickly turned his attention. It sounded young and disheartened, like a mourning dove singing its somber dirge amidst the night air. He went to investigate.

As he ran towards the sound out the cavern, he found himself drenched by the waterfall that blocked the inner chamber. “Gah!” he shouted.

The weeping stopped for a moment, but continued, much softer than before this time. Silver frowned- this child was likely afraid of the creature in the mural. Perhaps she’d seen that place while exploring and it was so scary she had to leave.

Silver shook himself dry and quickly ran towards the exit. “Hey!” he shouted.

A young girl sat on the cliffside. Her blue aura died down as she turned and spotted him. “Huh? Who are you?” she timidly spoke.

“I’m Silver,” the hedgehog replied. “Are you… okay? Did you lose your way?”

“It isn’t any of your business,” the moth said.

“Oh come on,” Silver said. “I’m just worried because I don’t know why I’m here.”

The moth turned. “Wait a minute… did you come out of that cave?” she asked.

“Well, yeah,” Silver replied. “I went through a portal to get here, and I ended up in quite literal hot water.”

The moth grinned and grabbed his hand, vigorously shaking. “It’s a pleasure to meet, you, Silver. My name is Nyx, and well… I summoned you myself.”

“But why?” Silver asked. “And why me?”

“I don’t really have a good hold on my powers, so I guess the forces beyond my control just… picked you,” she said.

“I mean, that doesn’t really make all that much sense, but I suppose if that’s the way it is, then I shouldn’t be so questioning about it.” He put a hand to his chin and leaned on his left foot. “Why did you call me here?”

“I had a vision of impending disaster,” Nyx said. “And I needed a champion who could possibly assist with that, someone who had great strength of will. I suppose that means you.”

Silver chuckled nervously. “Well, I wouldn’t say that much about myself…”

“No need to be so modest,” she said. “I’m certain you were chosen for a reason.”

Silver perked up a bit. “Do you mind if I contact home real quick?” he asked.

“O-Oh, sure,” Nyx replied. “Do what you need to.”

Silver nodded and turned for a moment before holding the ITCH up near his mouth. “Professor, this is Silver reporting in. Do you read me?”

“Schilver? Is zhat you? Your communicator… acting up… did you do…” The device fizzled a bit, and the hedgehog hissed as he realized that it had become waterlogged.

“Nyx, this is busted, how am I supposed to communicate with the Team from my dimension I’m from? I don’t know exactly know anyone here,” Silver said.

“Hm…” Nyx paused for a moment, her gentle aura turning a thoughtful shade of orange. “Ah, I know! You can take a boat over to Central City. There’s a mechanic there who’ll probably be able to give you a hand.”

“I dunno,” he replied. “There’s no way he’s freed up enough if he’s known by someone in a place this… remote.”

Nyx grinned. “He visited a few weeks ago with his cat friend. She was investigating the ruins and I was to accompany her, and he decided to tag along. Tails, I think his name was…”

“Wait, Tails? Like, Miles Prower Tails?” Silver asked.

“Is that his name? I thought his name was just Tails,” she replied.

Silver was already running off. Nyx frowned and flew after him. “Where are you going?”

“I have to find him! I remember him and his friends!” Silver said. “They’ll know what to do!”

Nyx flew faster, trying to pick up the pace to reach him. “Wait, you don’t even know which direction to go!”


	2. A Day in the Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The cast goes through their routine as usual, and as Sylphic is practicing with his powers, Bastette recovers the Echo Saphhire before her birthday party.

“Alright, so you think you’re ready to handle it?”

The red echidna was standing at the top of Angel Island’s shrine, looking down at the familiar face of Sylphic, the Hybrid who’d helped them with their last mission to save the planet. He was grinning, happy he’d brought a water-cooler tank of water with him to handle this fight. Well, fight wasn’t exactly the right word- this was the third week in a row that he’d been training with Knuckles to fight better.

“I suppose so,” Sylphic said, brushing his spines back. “You don’t think I’m ready now, do you?”

Knuckles backed up a bit and touched the Master Emerald. “Alright, we do this together,” he muttered.

He began to glow a little as the Emerald imbued its power into him. The sensation was a tickle, and he licked his lips as he felt himself gearing up for a fight.

Meanwhile, Sylphic had begun crafting projectiles. He’d mastered making them harder and more dense, meaning he could hopefully get them to break through Knuckles’ attacks.

Knuckles raised his arms, forcing a large chunk of ground to dislodge from under Sylphic. “Let’s keep you on your toes!” he shouted, throwing it over towards the wall of a cliff. He loved how the Emerald was capable of endowing him with geomancy.

Sylphic yelped and quickly improvised, shooting his sharp ice points at Knuckles while simultaneously crafting a halberd of ice from his remaining water. He frowned, already disappointed that he couldn’t have thought of a better weapon, but sliced through the patch of ground nonetheless.

Knuckles smirked as he landed on the ground, raising his arms and hurling a few hundred smaller rocks at him. He knew well he couldn’t destroy all of them before he made it over there, and as he completed his barrage, he lunged forward and went in to land a punch.

Sylphic replied by liquefying the halberd and surrounding his body with the water, pleased as each stone hit and fortunately slowed in its impact. He flung the shield around and launched it at the echidna, essentially throwing his rocks back. “Here dad, time to play some catch!” he yelled.

The echidna awkwardly grasped with his powers at the rocks, only remembering slightly too late that a wave of water was still hurtling towards him. He rolled to the side, but yelped as a tendril of it gripped his leg and dragged him off the Shrine.

Sylphic smirked as he held his friend up. “You’re losing your spark, old man.”

“You’re older than me,” the echidna replied. “And I’m not your dad, I thought we discussed that.” He frowned. “It’s still weird to think about it.”

“I know,” Sylphic said, holding him closer to his face. “Comment threw you off your guard though. Can’t let what I said get the better of you.”

“Shut up,” Knuckles replied. He kicked and struggled until he was able to push his arms outward, dispelling the water around him and dropping him onto the brick pavement.

“No retort beyond that?”

“Hey, I’m just glad you decided not to throw me back and forth like last time,” Knuckles said. He stood up and dusted himself off. He could feel the vibrations from the Emerald’s power fading. “Then again, Tails gave you an earful.”

“Heh, yeah, and I doubt it’ll be the last time,” Sylphic said. “The kid’s always so concerned about you getting hurt. I’m not that scary, am I?”

“You certainly spooked us a few months ago.” Knuckles harshly patted the hybrid on the back, making him stumbledover. “Sometimes our trust has to be earned. But don’t worry about him- he’s a lot more forgiving than he lets on. If anything, I’m the one you should worry about.”

Sylphic nervously laughed before he heard a buzz from his belt, and he reached down to a black phone he had on him. Carefully, he clicked the button down and held it to his ear. “Hello, Sylphic speaking,” he said.

“You’re late, for the fifth time this week,” a cool and collected voice chided. “Do you want to take your training seriously?”

“Geez,” Sylphic said. He held the phone to his chest and looked at the echidna.

“Shadow?” he guessed.

“Yeah.” The hybrid put the phone back up to his ear. “Sorry, I had to confirm with Knuckles that I was free to go. I’ve been practicing my powers with him.”

“That’s all well and good, but seeing the abilities you demonstrated two months ago I’d expect you to have a bit more drive to learn to harness that energy,” Shadow replied. “But if you aren’t interested, then--”

“No, I am, I just got a bit... sidetracked. I have a bit of hot blood, I’m not exactly great at sitting still or focusing for long periods of time,” he said.

“You get that from them,” Shadow said. “Even so, I’ve been very patient with you and you ought to understand that my nerves are wearing a bit thin,” he said. “If you don’t get up here soon, we are going to be having an extensive talk about your truancy.”

“Roger that,” Sylphic said. “By the way, how are you getting that good of a signal from the ARK?”

“I’m not, look at your 10 o’clock, about 60 degrees elevation.”

Sure enough, Shadow was standing on the exposed branch of a tree sticking out over the cliff. Sylphic swallowed and held the phone to his ear.

“How long were you watching?” Sylphic asked.

“The whole three minutes you two were fighting. It ended too soon. And you went too easy on him.” Shadow cleared his throat. “You’ve gone soft.”

“I could’ve given him a concussion otherwise,” Sylphic flatly replied.

“He’s more resilient, the worst that you’d give him is a bruise.” Shadow jumped down from the tree and landed on his feet before skating over to them. He hung up his phone and looked at the two of them. “Are you ready to go? We don’t have all day.”

Sylphic rolled his eyes and nodded. “Alright. See you later, Knuckles. Stay safe, and stay sane out here.”

“It isn’t lonely if you’re enjoying your time,” Knuckles replied.

* * *

“Sylphic, are you there?” Bastette asked.

“Yeah, of course. There’s a lot of background noise though, where are you?”

The cat itched at a wetsuit she was wearing as she searched the ocean floor. Her helmet gave her air from a large canister strapped tightly against the small of her back and hissed slightly under the released pressure. There was a setup from within the helmet that allowed her to make calls.

“I’m underwater, Syll,” she said. “You explained that you dropped the Sapphire somewhere down here, I’m just pinpointing the location since you gave me a mile radius of the ocean floor to search with a fine-tooth comb.” She grimaced as she heard a slight pop from a teensy spike of air being released from the valve. “Thanks for that, by the way.”

“Ehehe, you know me, there’s always an oversight,” the hybrid replied.

“Well, perhaps next time you could  _oversee_ a mission instead of leaving me to my own devices,” she said. “I can’t exactly be having you as a partner here if you aren’t gonna keep me company.”

“I mean, I have other responsibilities too, Bastette, I can’t exactly be tromping off on a treasure hunt when I have appointments to keep.”

The cat groaned. “Are you absolutely certain you aren’t planning anything for my birthday? You did remember it was today, right?”

“I did, and I just wanted a small group of friends to come and visit, nothing too big or fancy,” Sylphic replied.

“Thank you, you know how I feel around strangers,” the cat said. “And noise.”

“Well, you _are_ my friend after all, wouldn’t wanna make you too uncomfortable.” There was a slight crackle from a loss of fidelity from the line. “Ope, looks like we’re reaching the ARK soon, can’t stay for too much longer.”

“Are you finished?” a grumpy voice said from beyond the phone.

“Tell Shadow he needs to take a chill pill,” Bastette said. “Otherwise he’ll pop a blood vessel.”

“That isn’t true by any means, and I would know. Still, I’ll make him aware of your comment.”

“Thank you. I’m out.” She ended the call and continued her search.

The cat spotted a glint from the ocean floor as she approached a jagged rock formation, and she tilted her head as she examined the contents of the underside. It was a small treasure horde, no doubt the product of someone hiding their lost things. The sand barely covered the pile of shiny objects and swirled ever-so-slightly beneath the ocean current, and with a curiosity Bastette reached for the trove to examine its contents.

A maroon-striped arm reached out from inside and grabbed at her wrist, and the feline yelped as she came face to face with a cuttlefish person about as tall as she was. Two of the tentacles by their face were cut short like a set of sideburn bangs. They were wearing a white nightgown that fell to their kneecaps. “What do you think you’re doing?” they asked. Bubbles poured out of their mouth as their grim face peered out into the open water, but they were thankfully still audible. “That’s mine, thief!”

Bastette frowned. “I’m only here to examine the contents, and if I find what I’m looking for, I can negotiate a fair trade.”

“There’s no way I’d trade my pretties for the likes of your junk,” the cuttlefish said. “You can forget it.”

“Not even for this?” Bastette said, holding up a small clear box. Inside sat a pearl shining in sky blue. “Adabat has a bunch of these lovelies, but if you’re so inclined to keep your wares, I’ll leave you to it…”

The cuttlefish hummed a bit in resistant protest before finally giving in. “I suppose I could part with one of my treasures for that.”

“I knew you’d oblige,” Bastette said, slipping the pearl back into her wetsuit pocket. “Now, I’m looking for a Sapphire.” She held up her thumbs and index fingers and crossed them to form an eye shape. “Kinda looks like this?” she said.

“Oh, that? Yeah, you can keep that- I started having nightmares since I first found it two months ago. You can take that off my hands.” They reached in and fished out a familiar stone, and Bastette’s breath hitched as she fished the pearl back out of her pocket. “Did you drop this a while back or somethin’?” the cuttlefish asked.

Bastette grinned, gently baring her fangs. “You could say that, though I’d say it wasn’t me exactly that dropped it.” She chuckled nervously.

“Can I still have my pearl?” the cuttlefish replied.

Bastette and the cuttlefish exchanged items, and the cat held out her hand as a gesture of goodwill. “Bastette the Cat, and you uh… ma’am?”

“ _Sir_ , actually,” he replied. “Sorry about the dress. My wardrobe hasn’t been updated.”

“My apologies,” Bastette said. “Can’t say that I’ve never been there before. You’ll forgive me for the rookie mistake though, right?”

The cuttlefish shook her hand. “Brine, Brine the Cuttlefish. Enchanté, cheri.”

“Why sir, aren’t you formal!” she replied.

“I do my best,” Brine replied. “Though I suppose a self-made woman such as yourself would perhaps be interested in a meetup soon?”

“Maybe?” the cat wondered aloud. “There’s been a lot on my mind lately. Well that, and I have a birthday party tonight. But I can give you my contact information and we can meet up again soon.” She paused. “You… you can breathe air, right?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah! I live up on the surface most of the time. This is just my vacation spot,” he replied. “It’s a little shabby, but… it’s home away from home.” The cuttlefish whipped out his cell, clearly waterproofed to avoid damage. “Now, what’s that number?”

“Oh, right… it’s 341…”

* * *

Shadow’s voice reverberated over the speakers of the observation deck. The hybrid, who was trapped in the center of the room inside a glass capsule, breathed heavily on the glass. A blue Chaos Emerald shone in his left hand, and he swallowed as the black hedgehog continued to chide him.

“Focus,” he said. “You can handle this. Just work on a spot beyond the glass.”

“I’m trying, but my eyes are having trouble focusing when there’s a stain on the pod.”

“Then choose a different spot.”

“You don’t need glasses, you established that two weeks ago,” Shadow said. He was sitting on a bench across the room and lazily kicking back against the wall, his legs loosely crossed left over right and his hand clutching a small sound capture device. “Your habit of fixating on dust particles is dying hard.”

Rouge sat beside him and sipped on a soda she’d brought with her. Someone had to keep her friend from pushing the kid too far, and if it was her at least there would be a chance Shadow would listen.

“Imagine having memories of wearing glasses for most of your life all to suddenly not have to wear them anymore, I’m pretty sure you’d freak out too.” Sylphic breathed heavily. _“_ _I’m not a fan of tight spaces, either!”_

Shadow rolled his eyes. “That’s why you need to focus. If you can’t focus in a phobic state, how are you going to focus in the middle of a fight?”

“I didn’t exactly plan on fighting too often,” the hybrid said. He put his foot against the side of the pod and pushed against it until his back hit the opposite wall. “Shadow, there’s gotta be another means of--”

_“Focus!”_

“Shut up! I’m not like you, you _know_ that!”

“That didn’t stop other people from learning Chaos Control. One of your progenitors escaped a pod like the one you’re in right now, and his capsule almost exploded with him inside.” He stood up and sauntered over, stopped halfway between the wall and the pod. “Just focus on moving over to where I am, right here.”

Sylphic swallowed and gripped the Emerald in his hand. If he didn’t have gloves on, his knuckles would have been white. “Chaos…”

There was a quick flash before his face slammed into the glass, leaving a smear. “Ugh, do you get my point?” the hybrid groaned.

“I don’t understand,” Shadow said. “You and I both have Chaos Radiation in our bodies, you should be able to handle some sort of Chaos Control.”

“I’m not as practiced or as proficient as you, Shadow,” Sylphic replied, pulling himself up onto a sitting position. He panted, and his breath fogged up the glass a bit. “Your mastery of it was near-instantaneous because of how you were made. The sheer amount of radiation your sample was exposed to in development allowed for it. You have inhibitor rings so that you can manage _exactly_ how much sheer force there is in your body.”

“And you’ve shown me that you can imitate Chaos’ form in a state of severe negative emotions, who knows what you could do with the full force and a little more control?” Shadow retorted. “Ugh, just…”

He began to walk over towards the control panel in defeat.

“Oh come on, don’t act like that,” Sylphic said. “I hate it when you look at me like that.”

“I just don’t get it, okay? An ordinary hedgehog can pull it off, I can pull it off. By all accounts, you should be able to handle moving twenty feet, let alone a quarter-mile.” He stopped in front of the panel. “I should just let you out now, we can work on this later.”

Rouge grimaced. “You’re just gonna give up like that?”

“If he can’t take this seriously, there’s nothing I can do.”

The bat huffed and shot up to follow towards him. “He  _is_ taking this seriously. You’re just taking it even more seriously!  _Too_ seriously, in fact!”

Shadow grumbled. “I’m not going to force him to sit in a space for more than twenty minutes, especially with how limited oxygen is in there.” He began typing up the sequence to open the pod.

Rouge grabbed one of his arms. “Just give the kid a chance. He’s not even that old, are you really gonna be cranky because he isn’t learning as fast as you did?”

“I’m letting him out so he can get air, and then we will try something else.”

“Just one last shot,” Rouge said, nodding at the hybrid. “Pretty please? For me?”

Shadow grumbled and turned to Sylphic. “You have one more shot, understood? 3...2…”

Rouge grinned. “I think he needs a little more motivation than that,” she said, pressing one of the buttons.

Shadow’s eyes widened as the pod dropped through the floor, sending the hybrid out into the void of space. For exactly a second and a half it failed to register what had just happened, but as soon as it did he turned and angrily glowered at his partner.

“You only have yourself to blame for walking into that one,” Rouge said.

“I have no idea if he can survive re-entry! I don’t know if he’s---” His thoughts were cut short as a beeping noise came from the panel. They both turned and stared at the flashing red display.

_Twenty seconds to self-destruct._

Rouge frowned. “Whoops.”

Shadow grimaced, frantically trying to disengage the program but was only floundering. “Whoops doesn’t even  _begin_ to cover it.”

Rouge pushed him aside and began typing. “You’re too slow with your fingers, let me handle this.”

Shadow stared out into space at the capsule. “Five, four, three…”

_“Two… one…”_ a weak voice said from behind.

Shadow jumped as he turned to see Sylphic kneeling there, Emerald no longer in hand. _“_ _You lied about your ability to control it, didn’t you?”_ he fumed.

Sylphic fell forward next to Shadow and clutched his chest. “No, I seriously just did that. And the threat to my life kicked in my adrenal response. Maybe that's what triggers it.”

Shadow frowned as he spotted Sylphic feeling around on the floor. “What are you doing?”

“I can’t see anything, I think that much is obvious,” the hybrid snarked. “Mind helping me off the floor?”

Shadow hoisted him onto his feet. “This isn’t permanent, is it?”

“Sometimes stress causes the brain to not do its job. This’ll pass in an hour or two.” He shook his head. “I think, at least.”

“Where’d the Emerald go… oh, right.” Shadow tilted his head as he stared at Sylphic’s chest. “I keep forgetting that’s how that works for you.”

“Well,” Rouge said, moving away from the panel, “it’s already late afternoon, we better get back over to Amy’s place. Are you sure you want us coming? I know we aren’t always on pristine terms with their gang.”

Sylphic stared right through her and into the wall across the room. “Of course I want you there! You helped us with the mission as well.”

Rouge nodded. “I just hope that two extra guests isn’t going over her limit.”

* * *

“I’m surprised you came to me of all people for a new sensor,” Tails said. “Can’t G.U.N. outfit that for you?”

A hulking figure of red, black, and yellow metal stood still in Tails’ workshop. His eyes adjusted to the fluorescent lighting as the fox began to close up the compartment in his back. E-123 Omega, a former Eggman robot who worked for G.U.N., had indeed sought outside help.

_“Negative. I was not approved for the part_ _.”_ He paused.  _“Logically you were the next choice that came to memory._ _”_ His flat affect bounced along the walls of the room.

“Well, I’m flattered that you thought of me, but that still doesn’t answer why you need the part,” Tails replied, holding a screw between his teeth while working.

_“If I am to destroy the Doctor’s forces, I must be optimized.”_

“You really have a one-track mind about that, don’t you?” Tails nervously said, placing the last screw in and tightly winding it into the hole. “You can’t just relax?”

_“I do not need rest_. ”

“Uh… what about recharging?” Tails quipped.

There was a momentary silence before Omega processed his next statement.  _“...Are you done yet?”_ he asked, affect still flat.

A knock came to the door, and Tails waved his arm passively as he went to put his tools away. “It’s unlocked, feel free to let yourself i--”

“Eep!” Amy’s voice sounded. She was frozen in place, staring at Omega. “When did he get here?”

“Relax, Amy. He just came in for a quick fix, nothing’s wrong,” Tails said, turning around. “What did you bring in?”

Amy shuffled past Omega with a sheepish grin and brought the fox the bag of frosting. “This is the right flavor, right?” she asked. “I wanna make this special.”

Tails squeezed a bit of the orange frosting onto his finger and quickly took a lick. “Buttercream? Perfect.”

Amy sighed with relief. “I know that she wanted a small party but you can still pack a lot of fun into a small guest list.” She looked at the hulking robot. “You wouldn’t be happening to stay for the party too, big guy, would you?” she asked, grinning sweetly.

_“I cannot. I have a mission to attend to. Agent Rouge has asked me to accompany her this evening.”_

“Oh, she’s coming to the party as well.”

The robot fell silent. Amy opened her mouth to speak, but Tails shook his head. “Give him a second,” the fox said.

_“Conflict resolved. I will “relax” for an hour or two. And then I will go destroy more of the Doctor’s robots.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to follow me on my deviantart page as well! I write but I also draw and I do artwork of Team Trove over there. MY username here is the same as it is there.


	3. Eighteen Hollow Candles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nyx and Silver have a friendly but intimate competition on a boat. Meanwhile, Bastette celebrates her eighteenth birthday with her friends.

Nyx and Silver had fallen asleep on the boat across the bay. For two days, they’d been travelling across the water. It was now the late evening, and the trip was beginning to wear on their nerves.

“Why exactly do we need a boat again?” Silver asked. “We could have flown here and it would have been faster.”

“You’d have trouble figuring out exactly which way to go,” Nyx said. “You said you’re not from this world, so you obviously wouldn’t know where you’re headed.”

“I’m not stupid, there are signs. I can read!” the hedgehog said.

“Besides, I’ve been examining you the entire way,” Nyx softly spoke.

“That is _intensely_ creepy, little girl,” Silver said.

“I’m not a little… ugh…” Nyx sighed. “Forget it. I was just checking to make sure that I got the right person for the job.” She frowned. “Honestly, I’m still not sure.”

“Hey, that’s not very nice!” Silver replied. 

“No, it’s not you,” she said. “I just…”

Her eyes traced the water, staring into the inky blackness below as waves gently lapped at the sides of the boat. Tiny fingers of seaweed caressed the outer hull and slid beneath the waterline in quick succession. Nyx bit her lower lip and sniffed a bit.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have been so blunt,” Silver said.

“No, it isn’t that. It’s just… you’re so strange, and I barely understand how and why it worked that time. I’d been trying for years to understand my powers, and when I finally manage to use them, I feel doubt instead of pride.” Nyx looked at her hands. “What’s wrong with me?”

“I take it your story doesn’t have a happy beginning,” Silver replied.

“Heh, as happy as being forced to grow up during the prime of your childhood could possibly be,” Nyx said. “I was chosen to lead my moth haven by succeeding as the Elder of our community. I demonstrated great promise at an extremely early age, but as time went on, that waned dramatically.” Her aura glowed a bit duller, fading to within a few millimeters of her skin. “And now, despite having honed what tatters remain of those abilities, I’m brushed off as a child with no experience.”

Silver struggled to find the words to say. He wanted to let her know that he’d been there, that he’d doubted his own abilities. Even to this day, he feared he’d never be able to close some portals with his powers, or that he’d somehow be unable to stop any monsters that crawled into his world through them. After all, the first time he defeated any creature from them, he’d only barely had enough strength thanks to his friends.

But this child lived all alone, and what family she did have _didn’t_ believe in her, it seemed. 

“Hm,” Silver thought for a moment. “Do your powers include levitating things?” he asked.

“Sure, why?” Nyx asked. 

“Great, wait right there.”

He crossed the boat to the other side and carefully focused his gaze to the shore. Raising his hands, he felt at the shoreline until something caught his senses. Gently, he pulled it from the shore and towards him. Trapped in an aura of teal-green were a bunch of pebbles. 

Nyx turned and looked at him. “What’re those for?” she asked.

“Since you insist that we hang out on this boat together, we could at least pass the time a little better.” He shut one of his eyes and smirked. “How about a little friendly competition?” he asked.

Nyx’s aura turned a slight pink. “U-um, sure? I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever--”

“Great!” Silver said, letting go of the rocks. They clattered onto the deck. “I’ll go first.”

He pointed an index finger and picked up one of the pebbles. Carefully, he tried his best not to overshoot it- his desire to build her confidence came first. After a hard swallow, he flung the tiny rock about fifty feet beyond the boat, pretending at the same time to be under great strain. “How about that?”

“Oh stop it with the theatrics,” Nyx said. “You’re clearly trying to make me feel better.”

“It was worth a shot right?” Silver awkwardly said, shuffling back over. Nyx held her hand up to stop him.

“I didn’t say stop playing,” she said. Her pink aura gently covered a rock and brought it to the edge of the boat. She smirked at him and made a flicking motion, sending the levitating stone a hundred feet out. “Just stop being facetious.”

Silver chuckled. “You barely did that with any effort. You outta give yourself a break, Nyx.”

“I’ll do that _after_ I kick your butt at this,” she said, flicking another stone.

“Hey, no fair! It was my turn next!” Silver whined.

“Then get throwin’!” the moth replied, waving him over.

As the two continued their game, they proceeded to outdo each other over and over, and Silver watched in satisfaction as the moth girl’s face melted from doubt into confidence. Seeing those sorts of things was exactly why he enjoyed travelling through time and space and made the journey worth it more than defeating any monster. And besides, even if she didn’t like being referred to as a child, he knew she was still one at heart from the adorable smile she gave him.

But soon the smile faded into a quizzical glance. “Um, Silver?” Nyx asked.

The hedgehog noticed he was staring off into space a little bit. “W-whuh?”

“It’s your turn. I got mine pretty far, I’m not even sure how far it went. I couldn’t see it hit the water.”

“Hmmm…” Silver said, holding up a stone. “Let’s see if I can’t do the same then.”

* * *

Sylphic hissed as a small pebble crashed through the window and landed squarely into Bastette’s otherwise pristine cake. Carefully, he ran his finger under the tap in the sink and then held it over the cake where the pebble sat in a trail of its own impact. The water from his finger slinked down and gripped the rock, and the hybrid flicked his wrist as he pulled it from the frosting. “Oh, Amy’s gonna kill me,” he thought aloud.

He quickly went to get the candles for the cake, but before he left he scooted the massive pastry over to the corner, where no windows would let stray rocks in to destroy it. He only had a few minutes before the welcome wagon would arrive. And by welcome wagon, he meant Sonic carrying a cat across town at high speed. Why he thought the blue hedgehog of all party guests was the best to handle someone who’d probably put hours into her hair and makeup he’d never know.

Okay, perhaps he’d know, but the answer of his short-sightedness was something he cared little to comfortably admit.

He ran to the other room where Amy had left the bag of groceries for the team to sort, something that still wasn’t done, and pulled out the candles. “Okay, okay, I can just place one of the candles into the hole and cover it.” He went over to the cake and quickly began poking the candles into the thick frosting, but jumped as a loud and woodpecker-like knock came to the door. He winced in concern as he noted that one of the letters on the cake was now smeared, but he hastily put the last candle into the cake and used a nearby tray cover to conceal it.

As he walked to the door, he carefully plucked a blue piece of fabric from the couch and tied it around his neck perching the resulting bow directly above his crest of white fur. Then he reached for the knob to open the door.

It was a moment too late. Sonic kicked the door open and grinned. “You’ve arrived at your destination, miss,” he cooly said, carefully setting her down on her blue strappy heels. “I hope the ride wasn’t too bumpy.”

Bastette carefully straightened out her ponytail as much as she could before she caught sight of her friend laying on the floor. “I’m so sorry,” she apologized, reaching to help him up. “Sonic?”

The hedgehog nervously chuckled. “I’ll try to be a little more patient next time.”

Sylphic rolled his eyes as he pulled himself off the floor with the cat’s help. “It’s fine, a little rough and tumble isn’t going to kill me.”

“Is that… a bowtie?” Bastette asked.

“Oh this?” Sylphic said, touching the blue object on him. “Yeah, it is. Pretty nice, huh? Um…” he looked at her dark blue dress. “You look nice in it.”

“Thank you! You know, I like that on you, makes you look more professional,” she replied with a wink. “Though it looks like you put it on at the last minute. Here, lemme fix that.”

Sylphic went to protest but stopped short as her hands reached to his article of clothing. He didn’t want to fight her, not tonight of all nights, but his personal space was something he prided himself on. Since he wasn’t sure how to approach the subject, he simply kept quiet and only left a blush as an indication of his embarrassment.

“There we go!” the cat said. “All good to go! Anyways, I heard music out back. Hopefully you didn’t invite any strangers.”

“ _I_ didn’t invite the single stranger that accompanied Rouge and Shadow,” Sylphic said. “But if he’s a friend of theirs he’s probably a friend of ours too.” _At least I hope he is,_ the hybrid thought.

“I suppose it isn’t ideal,” Bastette said. “But I can handle it.”

“Great, let’s go!” Sonic said, bolting through the house and out the back door.

“He’s really excited about parties,” Sylphic said. 

“He _is_ a teenager after all. I think anyone his age would be,” Bastette said.

“You can’t really say the same though, can you?” the hybrid replied.

“What do you mean?” 

“Well, you might still have ‘teen’ in your age, but you’re eighteen now.” He paused. “How does it feel? To age, I mean?”

“Oh, right,” she said, smiling. “I forgot that age works differently for you, doesn’t it? Let’s see…” she paused. “Well, now that I’m an adult I can technically apply for permits without endless legal pursuits on my trail. You wouldn’t believe how difficult it was having to explain to border patrol why there was a kopesh in my trunk.”

“Is that what it means to be an adult to you?”

“Well, since my work is normally handled by people twice my age, I suppose I’ve grown up a little faster than most,” the cat replied. She wore a prideful smirk. “Now that I can get a permit I won’t have as many pesky roadblocks. I’m even more free than ever before!”

Sylphic laughed. “You’ve been waiting a long time to say that, haven’t you?” he asked.

“Eighteen years,” Bastette retorted.

The hybrid chuckled, and the infectious laugh spread to Bastette. It was such a strange thing to them both, that time had already flown this far along its migratory path of life. Sylphic laughed until he cried, and Bastette put a hand on his shoulder. 

“We should join the others,” she said. 

As the two of them advanced through the kitchen, the hybrid stopped. “I have one more thing I have to do. The others are outside waiting.”

Bastette nodded. “Don’t take too long with the cake.”

Sylphic froze. “Cake? What cake? There’s no cake!”

“You flatter me,” Bastette said, “but I know that’s what you’re doing. I’ll grab a slice of pizza from outside, you do what you must.”

Bastette headed out the door and onto the back patio of Amy’s home, where she was greeted by several party poppers welcoming her. The younger kids had been playing in the sandbox nearby and their fingers were caked with coarse wet grains of the dirt. She stepped back a bit as her sister approached to give her a hug. “Briar, the dress!” she said.

“Right,” Briar said. “Sorry…”

She grinned and pulled a napkin from the small table nearby and wiped her sisters hands. “There we go,” she said, picking Briar up off the ground. “Have you been helpful to Amy today?” she asked.

“Of course!” Briar replied. “Though I got tired a lil faster than usual…”

“That’s okay, I know that you’ve been working hard.”

“Of course! You took care of me, so I gotta try my best!” the little cat grinned, showing the slight gap in her two front teeth.

Bastette looked around the party until she spotted Knuckles by the food table. She let her sister go to continue playing with Cream and Cheese in the backyard. “Hello there,” she said, walking towards him. “Looks like someone got some time out of his busy schedule of relaxing to come visit little old me.”

Knuckles frowned. “It’s busy work, usually. But since I can keep an eye on my regular customer here,” he said, pausing to look over at Rouge, “I can spare a few hours to come see you.”

Bastette smirked. “You’re awfully fond of that one, aren’t you?” she quipped.

Knuckles grumbled. “I am not,” he said. “She drives me batty, pun completely intended.”

“I’m sure she does,” Bastette said, her smile only widening. 

“She’s not the only lady who does though,” he added, narrowing his eyes.

“Oh? And who’s the lucky girl then?”

“Forget it,” Knuckles said.

Tails flew over and landed beside Knuckles, who was already turning away with a slight flustered frown on his face. “Sorry about taking so long, I know that your ride got cancelled.”

“Yeah, and the money got stolen off the card too. I swear, you could do a better job with an app that keeps funds like that safe,” she said. 

Amy, who’d finished with her plate, was going up for seconds when she overheard the scholars talking. “So you got your money stolen _and_ your ride ditched you? You better watch out.”

“Huh?” Bastette said. “How come?”

“Don’t you know?” Amy said, putting a few pieces of fruit on her plate. “Bad things come in threes.”

“Amy, that’s just a superstition,” Tails said. “There haven’t been any tests that are consistent enough to prove that’s true.”

“But I swear it is!” The pink hedgehog placed a thick slice of cheesy pizza on her plate next. “Take today for example- I baked the cake for too long and had to redo it from scratch, and then the dishwasher broke so I had to go and buy paper plates.”

“It was an eight-minute fix, one of the valves was messed up,” Tails said. “Those take time to degrade.”

“And then there were the two hours that Briar was passed out,” she added.

“ _Two hours?_ ” Bastette said. “But I… Briar said that she only got tired a little bit.” She swallowed hard and searched the ground. She could feel her breathing getting more shallow as she remembered how her sister nearly drowned a few months ago, and the fox beside her caught her trembling at the memory.

Tails gripped her hand. “Relax, ‘Tette,” he said. “You shouldn’t get so worked up on your birthday like that. If it becomes a serious problem, we have a resident medic who’d be fine giving her a check up.”

The cat sighed. “I suppose you’re right.” She looked over to Shadow and Rouge, who were sitting at a table in the corner and lazily staring, only occasionally speaking. Besides them was a brutish-looking robot who towered over the fence posts. “Ugh, they look so bored,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

After gathering a plate of fruit for herself along with a slice of pepperoni pizza, she sauntered over to the trio and looked at them. “Enjoying the party?” she asked, though she already knew the answer.

“There’s lovely music and I wanted to dance with Shadow,” Rouge said. “But he’s being sour as per usual.”

“I’m not sour,” the hedgehog replied. “I just find birthdays to be something trivial.”

Bastette smiled. “It’s because you’re immortal, isn’t it?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. “Marking time until you die isn’t really something that applies to me.” He looked at Rouge. “I also don’t want to dance because--”

“Because you hate fun and everything it entails?” Rouge scoffed. “Fine, I’ll find a more suitable dance partner.” She walked away from the table and towards Knuckles, who caught her approach with a frown of deep concern. 

Bastette took her chair and sat down next to Shadow. “So who’s this hunk you got here?” she playfully asked.

“Oh, yes. Omega, this is Bastette,” he quietly replied.

The robot’s eyes locked onto her. _“Grave Delver Bastette the Cat, age 17.”_

“Eighteen, actually, as of today,” she replied. “Didn’t realize your database was behind, did ya?” She looked at Shadow. “Is he… one of Eggman’s bots?”

“ _Was._ He works with Rouge and I for the government now. Then again, he doesn’t really listen to anything we tell him,” he said. He reached a hand up and patted the cold exterior. “Do you, Omega?”

 _“Prime Directive is to destroy the Doctor’s robots to display my inherent superiority. Everything else is simply an added benefit to G.U.N.”_ He paused. _“I do not need to listen as I already know what to do.”_

Bastette grinned and patted him on the side. “Sure ya do, big fella.”

 _“Permission to engage?_ ” Omega asked.

“Denied,” Shadow quickly responded. “She’s the guest of honor, no need to use deadly force.”

“Besides, I was just testing out your shell. You’ve got a few weak points that could use some reinforcement.” She stood up and walked around to examine him. “From the outset it appears like you’re sturdy, but looking at you closely…”

Omega shuffled slightly. _“Are you certain, Shadow?”_

“Yes, Omega,” he said. A slight smirk crept across his lip, but it was so slight it could have been mistaken for a twitch. “She’s good at busting things open, I bet she knows the weak points in your armor.”

 _“Nonsense, my outer shell has been outfitted to avoid such dangerous miscalculations,_ ” Omega replied dryly.

“Right here,” Bastette said, knocking on a panel on Omega’s right side. “One bullet at just the right angle could expose your undercarriage and that would be all that’s needed to break you. I’d suggest getting that looked at before you go out on another bout.”

Omega was silent. Shadow was noticeably trying to hold in a laugh at the lecture his colleague was receiving.

“Shadow, do you even celebrate birthdays?” Bastette asked.

“Not really, no,” the hedgehog replied. “Don’t really need to. You mark your lifespan and you hope to set a record by the time you exit. Kinda not fun to compete if you know you’re gonna win from the very beginning.”

Bastette frowned. “Well, I brought some fruit I’m willing to share, and…” she paused as she heard the door from the house swing open. “Ah, looks like there’s cake on the way.”

Shadow sighed for a moment before he was unceremoniously yanked from his seat and dragged towards the epicenter of the party. “W-Wait, I--”

Bastette grinned. “Come on, I’ll show you!”

Bastette stopped at the table where Sonic and Tails were now resting. Sylphic had brought out the cake, with all eighteen pink candles twinkling in the open autumn air to accent the night. The cat grinned, and smiled as her friends- her _family_ \- sang out around her.

As she breathed in a big breath, she blew out her candles. “Oh, thank you all, this night is going great!” she said. She could feel tears welling up, but she quickly wiped them away and laughed. 

“What did you wish for?” Briar asked, approaching her sister.

“If I told you, it wouldn’t make the wish come true now, would it?” Bastette replied. “By the way, the first slice is yours, sis. Don’t wanna make you have to wait for the best part of the party.”

As she handed her sister the first slice, she turned to Shadow. “See?”

Shadow huffed. “I still don’t see the point. I mean, wishes? If you want things to come true, you have to make them come true yourself.”

“Aww, don’t be such a grump,” Bastette said. “Here, have some cake.”

Before Shadow could protest, the cat pushed a slice and a fork into his hands. He stared at it for a moment before carefully picking up a bit of the frosting and quietly taking a small lick of it. 

Bastette sighed. “This day has been really good for me,” she said. “Maybe Amy was wrong?” I mean, sure maybe that’s how bad luck works for her, but that doesn’t mean that’s how it happens to everyone, right?”

Shadow was about to speak when he spotted Briar running across the lawn. He thought nothing of it for the briefest of instants, but as he watched her, he noticed something off about how she was running. Her left leg was wobbling slightly, and it left him uneasy and he wasn’t sure why.

Bastette perked up as she heard Shadow’s fork drop. “Shadow?” she asked. “What’s…” She looked out onto the lawn, where she saw her sister lying on the lawn, face covered in cake and grass blades. She was unconscious and barely breathing.

“Inside, _now_ ,” Sylphic said, running over Briar to pick her up. “Amy, go get my first aid kit.”


	4. Make a Wish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bastette learns the terrible news of why her sister is sick, sending her into a spiral deeper than ever before. Sonic tries to lift her spirits with an excursion, while Silver and Nyx meet with Tails to fix the former's communication line and discover the rules to the Lunar Gate.

Bastette stroked her sister’s head as the hybrid examined her on the living room couch. She was luckily stable enough to breathe normally again, but she was still out like a light, and it seemed that she’d be that way for a while longer. Bastette was fighting back tears, trying to convince herself that the Rule of Three wasn’t real.

Amy pursed her lips as she handed the medic an ice pack. “Are you sure that it’s that bad of a fever?” she said.

Sylphic nodded, applying the ice pack to the girl’s forehead before turning to his friend. “Bastette, you said your family didn’t have any particular history of illness, right? Nothing stress-induced or hereditary?”

“Not to my knowledge,” she said. “I mean, my dad limped, but I don’t think that can be passed on.”

The hybrid sighed. “I’m trying to make sense of this myself. Some of the symptoms don’t line up with anything catchable. I don’t think it’s normal for a child to have tachycardia that severe for a matter of a minute followed by a gradual resting heartbeat. It also isn’t normal for anyone to have breaths that are stuttered like they were a moment ago.”

Amy frowned. “Do you have any idea what it is, then?”

The rest of the team was gathered around, and though Rouge and Omega were clearly not paying attention, Shadow was unusually pensive. Sylphic noticed that odd interest immediately, and then looked back at Briar. 

The scent of lilac filled his mind as he felt a heavy drop in his stomach. Automatic functions going on and off like that was only a function of the nervous system. _Just like…_ he thought.

“Oh no…” he breathed. “No, no no no…”

Bastette’s eyes widened as she caught his worried words, and she amplified his feelings tenfold. “What, what?” she asked. “What’s the matter with her?”

“I…” Sylphic swallowed hard, desperately trying to fight back tears.

Sonic looked at him. “Syll, you okay buddy? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I need a minute,” the medic said. 

He shakily stood up and immediately walked over to Shadow, tightly grabbing his arm and dragging him outside onto the patio, where their voices became muffled as he accidentally slammed the door. Through the window the rest of the group, especially the new adult, stared at the spectacle of their unhearable conversation. First, Shadow bitterly crossed his arms, clearly upset that he’d been grabbed so violently.

But as Sylphic opened his mouth and a few tears ran down his cheeks, Shadow’s solid annoyance sublimated into an intense, wide-eyed stare. He turned and looked inside at Briar for a moment before turning back to the barely-stable medic. He put both hands on Sylphic’s shoulders and gave him a good shake as though he were begging him to keep it together.

The medic sat up but refused to look Shadow in the face. He couldn’t focus on anything but the ground as he spoke. The light seemed to have drained from his eyes as he lazily wiped away his tears.

The black hedgehog looked back inside and made a pulling motion with one of his fists. Sonic, who was already a bit uncomfortable at the party’s sudden halt, carefully sauntered over and pulled the blinds closed. “Eheh… they’ll be back in soon.”

Bastette was shaking and clutching her sister. Her claws sunk a bit into her sister’s soft red fur and the tears she tried in vain to hold back soaked into the jumper she was wearing. Whatever was happening was bad, and she could tell.

Briar stirred, and the storm broke overhead for the orange cat. “Sissy?” Briar spoke. “What happened?”

“Aha… hahaha!” Bastette laughed, trying not to cry from the mood whiplash. “I… N-Nothing happened, Briar, it was just a tumble. Only a tumble.”

For the next twenty minutes, the rest of the guests milled about inside. Bastette spoonfed cake to her sister, whose movements were still weakened considerably, and Sonic and Tails stared at each other as the latter tried to come up with some reason why the hybrids outside still hadn’t returned. Sonic tried to remain optimistic, but seeing the expression on Tails’ face brought him to tightly wrap his arms around his friend in a comforting hug.

And then, finally, the door swung open. Sylphic was still shaking, but Shadow had regained composure enough to gently usher the medic back to the couch and sit him down. Neither of them could easily look Bastette in the eye.

Sylphic was the first to speak, but his voice faltered. “Bastette, I-I’m sorry for this. I r-really am, it’s…” He forcibly swallowed. “Y-your sister is… she’s sick. Very sick. She…”

Shadow sighed and finished his sentence. In four words alone, Bastette’s eyes gave her earlier tears a run for their money.

“She has NIDS, Bastette.”

* * *

Sylphic frowned as he helped Briar back onto her feet. Another twenty minutes had passed, and she’d finally recovered from her earlier fall. She still had a look of fear in her eyes though, although it wasn’t for her own safety this time.

She looked out the back door at Bastette, who sat silently in the grass, motionless as she stared up at the stars and the bright gold moon. “She’s so lonely out there.”

“I know, but we’re gonna get you back in working order,” the medic said. “Tails is working on something to help you avoid falling flat like that again, okay?” 

_How much longer can I keep up the facade of being alright?_ he thought to himself. _She’s a smart child, after all. She’s bound to catch on soon._

Amy had come back inside from accompanying her, but her head shook. “Nothing. I can’t get her to speak or anything,” she said, wringing her hands. “She won’t move, won’t look at me… she keeps staring up at the sky.”

Shadow grimaced. “She can’t keep sulking forever,” he said, walking towards the door.

The hybrid jumped up and ran over to him. “Wait, let me handle it. I have a better bedside manner.”

Shadow paused for a moment before turning around, waving his arm. “She’s all yours.”

Sylphic took a long breath in and stepped over the threshold. “Bastette? It’s me.”

He was greeted with silence, but her ears flicked back to listen to him.

“Listen, we can figure this out. I still have a lot of my know-how from my past,” he said. “I’m certain there’s a solution to this.” He sat down next to her, hoping his presence would at least make her silence bearable.

Bastette sniffled and huffed a bit before pulling her knees closer to her face. She was shaking harder than ever, and her fingers firmly clutched the grass beneath her as though she were about to go into orbit, and if it weren’t for both physical and emotional gravity, she probably would have.

Sylphic looked back over at Sonic, who was standing in the doorway with a handkerchief. The hybrid nodded and the hedgehog slowly walked over and took a seat on her other side. 

Sonic struggled to find the right words at first, but after a hard swallow he held the handkerchief up to her face to wipe a stray tear away.

Bastette’s eyes locked onto his and she firmly grabbed his arm. “I don’t want your pity,” she said.

“It isn’t pity,” Sonic said.

“Don’t play dumb with me, Sonic. You and I both know the situation is pitiful,” she said. “Not to mention hopeless.”

“Were you _not_ listening to Syll here?” Sonic asked. “There’s still a chance!”

“What, that she’ll be bound to a bed her entire life? That she’ll have to be wearing things at night so she doesn’t suffocate in her sleep?” she frowned. “I never wanted that for her!” She threw his arm away from her. “I don’t want your pity.”

“He’s just trying to help,” Sylphic said. “You could at least acknowledge that.”

“No amount of acknowledgment is going to cure her,” Bastette replied. “No reason to embellish my words with niceties if it doesn’t do anything.”

Sonic sighed. “Listen, I get that you’re sad, I really do, but--”

“No, you don’t!” Bastette yelled, turning her head to him. “You don’t get it at all! You don’t know what it’s like to always be watching out for a sibling like that. You don’t have any siblings!”

Sonic swallowed the harsh tone he impulsively wanted to give back and lowered his voice. “I might not have a sibling, but I still know what it’s like because I worry about Tails being in danger. I worry about it a lot more often than you’d think.”

Bastette’s head sunk back down into her knees. “It’s not the same.”

Sonic went to open his mouth to speak, but the medic put a finger up.

“Bastette,” he said, “you shouldn’t be pushing him away like that, or anyone for that matter. We’re trying to help.”

“What would you know? You were born three months ago! You’ve never lost anybody, and I’m about to lose everybody!”

The words stung Sylphic to his core. On one hand, she was right in her thinking- he was practically a newborn, at least regarding his current lifespan. But his mind was a separate matter entirely. He remembered much more from times past, and there were still plenty of bitter recollections that often crept up on him at inopportune moments. While she probably meant no ill intent with her statement and didn’t know how hurtful it would have been, it didn’t stop the medic from standing and getting cross with her.

“I didn’t ask for her to die, Bastette, you know that!” he shouted as he stood. His eyes held a strong spark of fire within, but were also glazed over like frosted glass.

The cat looked up at him, her eyes widened in surprise. She’d never seen him this color of angry.

“I didn’t even get to say goodbye to her! I didn’t get a chance to tell her how much I loved her! How she reminded me of her mother. How every day she would come in and say good morning even when I’d been up all night working hard to cure… her…” His voice petered out as his eyes began to glisten again. “That’s it!”

Before the cat could get a word in edgewise, the hybrid was already on his way inside the house, calling out to Rouge to make contact with her higher-ups. She turned her head away from his general direction and stared back into the grass, watching as the moonlight highlighted the upper crest of each blade.

Sonic held the handkerchief out to her. “I’m not gonna make you take it but it’s here if you need it.”

Bastette frowned and reluctantly took it from him, wiping her smeared eyeliner from her cheeks. “I don’t get it, why on my birthday? Why now?” she said.

“I dunno,” Sonic said. “But nothing’s gonna get done if you just wait for a miracle. You gotta get out there and make wishes happen.”

Bastette almost wanted to smile. She knew how he and Shadow would butt heads over their sense of justice, over their philosophies. To hear the same thing echoed back was comforting, but also somehow deeply haunting to her. 

She sniffled and rubbed her eyes again. “When I blew out my candles, all I wanted was for this night to never end. Now I wish that it never happened at all.”

“We can’t change the past, we can only work with what we’ve got. And what we've got is right here, right now,” Sonic said, standing up. “Come on, let’s go make the rest of this night fun. Your sister’s already feeling way better.”

The cat reached up to grip Sonic’s hand, but before she could meet him halfway, a glimmer caught her eye. The two of them looked up towards the sky, where a long streak crossed the stars.

“Looks like fate decided to give you another candle to blow out, huh?” Sonic said. “You should make a wish. It’s still your birthday, after all.”

Bastette nodded and fixed her gaze on the streak, which was still speeding through the sky. “I wish tha--”

And then, the streak fell further down into the nearby cliffs and impacted. Bastette stood up quickly. “D-did you see that?”

Sonic nodded. “Wanna ditch this place and go see what landed?” he asked, shooting her a grin. “Maybe it’s a present.”

Bastette nodded, and for the first time in nearly an hour, a smile broke across her face.

Sonic crouched down and put his left arm behind her knees before lifting and tilting her back onto his right one. “Alright, birthday girl, let’s get this show on the road.”

As Sonic geared up and pushed forward in a sprint, his arm bumped into a passing stranger and his flying friend. He’d been moving too quickly to catch either of their faces, but as the impact of his limb struck him he caught a flash of fire in his vision for a mere second. He went to a dead stop as soon as he’d turned a corner and paused. “What the heck was that?” he thought aloud.

“Is something wrong?” Bastette asked. She carefully clung to him so as to not tumble away.

“N-no, it was nothing,” he replied, and he continued towards the impact site.

* * *

Nyx carefully knocked on the door and landed on the ground. She was not fond of disturbing people this late in the evening, especially since she knew this person. She hoped Tails wouldn’t be too bothered.

The door swung open, and the moth was greeted by a red echidna. “Um, hello?” he asked, a little bit stupefied. “Are you here for the party too? I mean, I wouldn’t exactly come in here, now isn’t the best time.” 

“Party?” Nyx said, trying to avoid sounding like an excited child. “I didn’t even know there was a party here. Um, we checked the workshop, and there was a note saying that Miles was here.”

“Oh, I see, um… come on in.” He paused. “Actually, I think he’s in the garage working on some braces, I’ll take you there from the outside.”

“O-oh, uh… okay,” she said. 

Silver spotted him and grinned. “Knuckles!” he shouted. “I haven’t seen you in a while!”

Knuckles jumped back a bit as the hedgehog approached him, thrown off by how vocal he was. “Uh, who are you?” he asked.

“You… you don’t remember?” Silver said. “We were working together six weeks ago, surely you should remember that--”

“Afraid not, pal. You must be mistaken- I’ve never seen you before.” Knuckles raised a hand up to his chin. “Though you do look an awful lot like Sonic. You wouldn’t happen to be related, would you? Wouldn’t be the strangest thing to happen to us today.”

“M-Me?” Silver asked. “No, I’m not. I’m… not exactly from around here though.” He tilted his head. “You’re definitely Knuckles. Are you sure you don’t me?”

Knuckles raised an eyebrow. “Little girl, is he with you? Why is he acting so weird?”

Nyx frowned. “My name is Nyx,” she said. “And yes, Silver is with me. He’s being chaperoned because he doesn’t know where he’s going. I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t call me a little girl.”

“Right,” Knuckles replied. “So, Silver and Nyx, why exactly did you wanna see Tails so bad?”

“Because I have a communicator that needs fixing,” Silver said. “Tails is the best at handling the more complex problems from what I remember.”

“Ah, so Tails knows you! Gotcha,” Knuckles said, walking past them. “Come this way, I can open the garage for you.”

As they walked, Silver took in his surroundings- a bright and starry night, the quiet lull of smooth jazz being played from the backyard, the scent of buttercream frosting hitting his nose and curling around him. It was all so calming to have such a wonderful change of pace from the constant threat of reality tearing itself apart from the inside out, and he began to appreciate Gold talking him into coming here.

Knuckles pulled open the garage door. “Hey Tails, kid says she knows you, and she brought a friend along who says he needs a fix.”

Nyx huffed quietly but waved at the fox. “It’s me from the Valley, remember?”

“Of course! Gimme a sec, I’m putting a few touches on this.” He carefully went back to his work but continued speaking. “So, you have a piece of tech for me to fix?”

“Well, yeah, Tails,” Silver said. “I thought you might be able to help me out. You helped me out a few weeks ago, and I figured you’re the best there is, so--”

“Wait, what?” Tails asked, looking away from his work to look Silver up and down. “I don’t remember seeing you in my shop before, and I have a pretty good memory.”

“But I remember you, why don’t you remember me?” Silver asked.

“Ah, I get it,” Tails said. “Wait just a minute. Knuckles?”

“Huh?” Knuckles snapped out of the momentary space-out as Tails handed him the finished leg braces. 

“Take these in to Briar, hopefully they’ll help her avoid another faceplant.”

“I’m on it.”

Tails turned as Knuckles rushed back into the house. “Now, you remember me, but I don’t remember you, is that right?” Tails said. “Nyx, did you say something about the Lunar Gate when I visited? You know, that pool of water in a cave on the outskirts of Kingdom Valley?”

“Yeah,” the moth replied. “I did.”

“Then that means… you’ve done it! Congrats!” Tails said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “You opened the Gate!”

Nyx frowned and blushed. “There isn’t too much time right now, Tails. We can talk about it later. I need help for my friend. He lost contact with his team a few days ago and he’s been on edge about it ever since.”

Tails gestured to Silver. “Can I see it? How was it damaged?”

“Waterlogged, I think,” Silver replied. “I use that device to communicate with the Professor and Gold. Well, and the Bits, but they don’t talk in anything but binary.” Silver scratched the back of his head. “Our relationship is complicated.”

“I see,” Tails said. “And this Professor… what was his name?”

“Professor von Schlemmer.” Silver brought his arm back down before shrugging. “Are you sure it can even work? He designed it to communicate through dimensions.”

“I’ve built a TV with paperclips, reprogrammed a supercomputer with dish detergent and a toothpick, and I rerouted a government cell phone to operate at a range that shouldn’t be possible. This shouldn’t be too difficult of a fix.” Tails took the watch-like device off Silver’s wrist and examined it. “Hmm, a very high-powered device. This should be fun.”

Silver tilted his head as the fox studied his communicator. “So, will you do it?” he asked.

“Hey, if we’re friends in another dimension, we’re friends here, right? Just as long as you don't do anything that would make me retract that statement.” Tails turned around and hopped up onto his worktable chair. “It doesn’t look completely dead, so it’ll just be a matter of fixing the parts that don’t stand up to water well.”

Nyx turned as Silver walked away from the garage and around the corner. “What’re you up to?” she asked, gently fluttering over to his position at the white picket fence.

Silver was staring into the yard, where a familiar blue hedgehog was consoling a crying cat. The grief distorted her voice slightly as she wiped black stains into a handkerchief. Silver reached for the latch, when something caught his attention off in the distance. A shooting star streaked across the sky, growing larger and larger until it made a violent boom against the side of a distant cliff.

“What was that?” Nyx asked. 

“I don’t know,” Silver replied, watching as the two stood up in the grass. “But, I gotta talk to So--”

He was knocked back as the blue hedgehog knocked open the gate on the fence and bumped his arm into him. “Ouch!” he yelled, falling over. “Hey, wait just a… minute…”

His body glimmered in the light of the street lamp, or at least it did as he looked down and stared at his fingers. They were jagged, covered with facets and gleaming as they shot reflections back at his face. His eyes watered for a moment, but as he shook his head to clear his mind and get a better look at the hallucination, it vanished.

He paused as he looked down at his hands. For an instant, he thought he’d seen something he shouldn’t have, and he shot to his feet and immediately kicked off the ground. He knew almost immediately that something was about to go wrong, he could feel it in every fiber of his being. “Nyx, stay here and wait for the ITCH to be done getting fixed. I have to catch him before he makes a mistake!” He flew towards the blue blur, calling “Hey, wait!” as he sped off into the distance.


	5. Found Impact

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Bastette approaches a meteorite, she comes to find its contents rather interesting, possibly even useful.

“Are you certain you want to do this?” Rouge asked. “You know what they did, right?”

Sylphic carefully zipped up the blood sample he took from Briar into his first-aid kit and nodded. “The only way I’m gonna be able to look for a means to cure Briar is to get my hands on Gerald’s old research.” It still sounded strange speaking about his old self in the third person, but the medic bore with it.

“G.U.N. isn’t exactly keen on _anybody_ having access to that, you know. Stuff’s of a high security level.” The bat paused as she received a message on her burner phone. “Alright, he’s on the way to pick us up. Shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.”

Shadow was sitting on the couch again, staring at Briar as Knuckles helped Briar equip the braces to her legs. He couldn’t really say too much, the shock of it all was only now kicking in and he was clearly trying to process it all.

Rouge put a hand on his shoulder. “Shadow, are you ready to go?” she asked. “This call shouldn’t be too much longer.”

“Y-yeah,” he replied. “I think so.”

The medic circled around the couch and sat back. “I can’t believe I’m about to work with those… ugh, giving them the courtesy of such words would be too kind.”

“I know, but it’s only temporary,” Shadow said. “And besides, they’ve wanted you back since you escaped. You can’t convince them not to lock you away, but Rouge and I can with the leverage we have.”

“Oh?” Sylphic asked. “And what leverage is that?”

“We are some of their best agents out there, if we threaten to walk, they will not hesitate to comply.” Shadow rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Though I doubt they will make this easy. The last time you went through and got those files, it took you five hours _with_ Rouge’s help, and that wasn’t even useful information.”

“Fair,” he said. “In any case, I’ve equipped Amy with all the basics in case things go south with Briar again. I was surprised to find out she’s actually CPR certified.”

“I can’t possibly imagine who she’d be saving that for,” Shadow snidely remarked. “Speaking of Sonic, where did he run off to? I didn’t see him in the backyard. Come to think of it, I haven’t seen the birthday girl either.”

Rouge frowned. “They better not be off doing anything stupid. Last thing we need is another big problem.”

Omega patiently stood behind Rouge, but it was clear that despite his robotic form, he was most certainly wearing thin in his nerves. _“Have we finished briefing?”_ he asked.

“Hang on just a moment longer, big fella,” Rouge said. “Syll, you should go make sure if anyone else has seen where the teen bounced off to.”

The medic nodded and went out the front door. As he stepped over the threshold and onto the concrete, he couldn’t help but notice how the sky had a strange trail of smoke overhead and his nose prickled with the scent of rotten eggs. He swallowed hard as he wracked his brain for what that could have been.

“Sylphic?” Tails said, catching the medic off guard. 

He jumped, but awkwardly did his best to regain his composure. “M-Miles?” he said. “I wasn’t just…”

“Don’t worry, I saw it too. It looks like Sonic and Bastette went to go check out the impact of the meteorite.” He looked back as a moth girl gently fluttered to his side. “You should meet an acquaintance of mine. This is Nyx, she’s from Soleanna.”

“It’s… nice to meet you,” Sylphic replied. “What brings you here? You weren’t late to the party, where you?”

Nyx shook her head. “I…” she paused, tilting her head at him. “I have a responsibility to take care of, and my champion is assisting me in this endeavor. His watch is broken.”

The medic smirked. “Big words for a little lady. You’re quite learned. I like it. But what do you suppose you’ll do once the device is fixed?”

Nyx swallowed. “I… I’m not quite sure, to be honest.”

Sylphic pursed his lips. “And where exactly is this champion? Truancy isn’t a noble quality.”

Nyx wrung her hands. “He went after a couple of runners after the meteorite hit the cliff,” she explained. “He was silent for a moment, but then immediately went after them, saying that they were about to make a mistake.”

“Why would he be able to tell if something bad was about to happen?” Tails asked.

“I… I don’t know.” 

Sylphic frowned. “Miles, you should go with her and Knuckles to investigate. Even if it’s nothing to be afraid of, the meteorite might have left some traces of minerals that could prove useful.”

“That is true, and meteoric iron can also be pretty useful if I’m making a hefty tool that’ll see a lot of use.” He looked at Nyx. “What do you say?”

The moth bit her lip. “I suppose so,” she timidly replied.

The fox grinned. “And you, Sylphic? Gonna join us?”

“I’m afraid not,” the hybrid replied. “I’m gonna be looking through the old research. I doubt G.U.N.’s Team is gonna be thrilled to see me.”

“Ah, right,” Tails said. “Kinda hard to bury the hatchet, huh?”

The medic swallowed hard. “Putting it lightly,” he replied. “In any case, if there’s a strange happening, I know your friend tends to be close behind. And he’s a magnet for danger.”

Knuckles exited the house and heard what they’d said. “Then we have no time to lose, do we?” he said. “Come on, we’ll see where they went.”

As the older crew were left standing alone, Sylphic turned. “First thing’s first- is Rouge done on the phone?”

Shadow sighed. “A few more minutes and she should be in the clear. Let’s hope the General isn’t too displeased.”

* * *

Sonic set Bastette down in the middle of the clearing. The grass was scorched and still smouldering a bit, and the trees seemed to have a split where the meteorite came through. Even so, the fire from the fallen cosmic body had gone out before any of the surroundings had.

Sonic looked around when he spotted a small cluster of people had already gathered. “Looks like we showed up to the party a little late, huh?” he commented.

Bastette smiled, though the melancholy of before still glowed a bit on her cheeks. “I’m sure they’re just as confused as us.” She carefully walked towards the meteorite, but Sonic grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“I’m not gonna stop you from going up to it, but are you sure it’s safe?” he said. “Wouldn’t want you to catch fire, especially in a dress that nice.”

The cat smirked. “It’s fine, I’ve ruined more expensive ones than this.”

“Okay…” Sonic’s voice was a little concerned, but he did his best to hide it as he accompanied her onwards. “So, what do you think is inside?” he asked.

“Sonic, it’s a meteorite, not a geode,” Bastette replied. “It’s likely a bit of space debris that is solid all the way through. Meteorites don’t really have anything _in_ them.”

“Aww, c’mon,” Sonic said. “You can’t expect a birthday gift to come without wrapping paper.”

Bastette pursed her lips. “Sonic, that’s…” she shook her head. “Nevermind,” she said. 

The people around her had their eyes trained on her as she approached the object. It was about the size of a volleyball, and a slight bit of smoke was still rising from it. The fumes reeked of sulphur, which was already strange given the composition of most meteorites. It was also perfectly spherical, definitely not like how something such as a meteorite should be. Bastette swallowed, wondering what it could be if not a meteorite.

She gingerly touched it, pausing as she felt the heat off of it. She pulled her hand away on instinct, but as soon as she did, the smoke went out. “What on Earth?” she asked aloud. “What is this?”

Sonic put a hand on her shoulder as she reached her hand out again. “Be careful, Bastette. Don’t get burned.”

The cat nodded and gently ran her finger along the rock, whose heat had now vanished. “Sonic, I don’t recall any impact sites I’ve been to having a rock this round.” She stopped as her finger came across a jagged edge and inspected what she discerned was a crack, where she spied the slightest hint of a black crystalline structure. “This isn’t a meteorite, this is something else entirely.”

“Can you crack it open?” Sonic said. “That noggin of yours should be able to handle it.”

“Only one way to find out,” she said, and she curled her fingers and began to tap as she held her face a bit closer to the meteorite. “Hm, yeah, I’m definitely detecting some hollow space inside. It isn’t a whole lot, but I can still crack it. Just need to find the right spot to hit.”

Her knuckle stopped at the very top of the meteorite, and she pursed her lips. “Alright, this should be the one.”

“You wanna count to three?” Sonic asked. 

Bastette nodded. “One…” she said, turning to face the rock and clutching it with both her hands.

“Two…” Sonic said, still holding her shoulder. His grip tightened a bit. Something still was off about this, but he wasn’t going to spoil her birthday any more than it already was.

“Three!” she said, bringing her head down. 

In an instant, a white light flashed across the field, and Sonic was tossed backwards and into the grass with a thud. “Bastette!” he yelled, hurriedly getting to his feet and running back towards her.

The cat woke up near immediately and tried to stand, only tumbling over as she clutched her forehead. She looked paler than normal, and the hedgehog quickly went to steady her. “Are you okay? I think you might’ve bonked your head there a bit,” he said. “Whoa, wait a minute.”

Bastette snapped back into focus and looked at him. “Is something wrong?” she said.

“Your forehead, there’s… a jewel in there!” Sonic said, reaching up for it. “Here, lemme get it out.”

“Wait, don’t--” Bastette said in a moment of quiet panic.

As his fingers touched the surface of the smooth black gem, the embers within pulsed hot with a variety of colors, and in an instant, he was launched back and into a nearby tree. His head hit a sturdy branch, and as he fell forward onto the ground he struggled to stay awake. Through the ringing in his ears he barely managed to hear the sound of somebody calling him from out of his line of sight.

The cat looked down and stared at her hands for a moment. “Was that…” She pulled out her phone from a pocket in her dress and opened her mirror app. Carefully she angled it to stare at what appeared to be a black opal lodged in her forehead, cut in the shape of an eye, tilted sideways in its perch like the overlap of two circles. “Wait, this is… is this another one of them?” she asked herself, bewildered.

She looked over at Sonic, who was wobbling to steady himself. “Oh no!” she called, running out to support him.

She stopped, though, as an unfamiliar figure approached the blue blur first. “Sonic!” he said, “are you okay?”

“Ugh… who…?” Sonic moaned, still clutching his head.

“Easy there,” the white hedgehog replied. “You’re hurt, and you might have gotten a concussion.” He carefully lifted one of Sonic’s arms onto his shoulder.

“Who are you?” Bastette asked, slowing her approach. She carefully took note of his garments and tried to parse out his origin, but she drew a blank. Nowhere she knew held his particular style of cuffs, nor were his nervous mannerisms of grinding the edge of his boots into the dirt familiar to her.

“I’m Silver,” he said, turning to face her. He was clearly distraught about something but it wasn’t entirely clear what. “What did you do to him?”

“I… I didn’t mean to throw him into the tree, I swear!” she said, raised her hands. “It just sorta happened. I mean, I would never…”

Silver paused. “What is that in your forehead?” he asked.

Bastette squirmed a bit since his pensive gaze was wrought with extreme caution. She frowned. “Would you stop looking at me like that?” she asked, a bit peeved.

Almost as if on cue, Silver’s head turned away. The white hedgehog gritted his teeth and tried to pull his head back towards her, but he grunted in pain as he managed only an inch of movement. “How are you doing that?” he groaned.

“What?” Bastette said. “What do you mean?”

“ _I can’t look at you,”_ the hedgehog said. “I’m trying to talk to you but I can’t physically look you in the face.”

“You should be able to,” the cat replied. 

Silver gasped as his head snapped back towards her, and he had a new look on his face- one of absolute horror at his discovery.

Bastette carefully touched the Opal. “It couldn’t be…”

Sonic finally pulled himself together, but Bastette still noticed something wrong with him. His pupils were two different sizes, ever so slightly off. “Sonic, you’ve got a concussion! I’m so sorry, I’ll fix--”

“Bastette, I’ll be fine, I’ve been roughed up worse, remember?” he replied.

“It isn’t okay!” Bastette replied, unusually loud this time. She stomped the ground but failed to notice how the grass beneath her foot had crystalized. Silver noticed though, and he nervously bit his lip as he raised a hand to warn her before he was abruptly cut off.

“Bastette, I’m sure that--”

“Just let me fix it!” she shouted, clenching her fists.

Sonic hissed and clutched his head again. “Augh, Bastette, what are you doing?” he asked, gritting his teeth.

“I…”

Sonic looked at her again, but this time his eyes were back to normal. He shook his head as he went steady and stood up fully. “Bastette, did you just… heal me?”

“Sonic!” a young voice cried. The trio turned to catch Tails flying in, followed close behind by Knuckles and a young moth girl.

“We were so worried about you guys!” Tails said. “You two didn’t get into too much trouble, right?”

Sonic pointed to Bastette. “She accidentally threw me against a tree when I tried to remove whatever’s in her forehead,” he said. “Something tells me it’s not friendly.”

Nyx tilted her head. “No, it couldn’t be…” she breathed.

Bastette nervously laughed as the girl flew closer to her. “Could you back off?” she asked.

Immediately, Nyx was pushed a few feet away as though she were caught in a gust of wind. Tails watched as she struggled to move forward, only for the invisible barrier of intangible wind to remain. “What’s wrong?” the fox asked.

“That’s an Eye of Luneria, I’m certain of it now,” she said. “How it came from space I don’t know, but it’s the Eye with the power of desires.”

Bastette paused. “Wait, you can come closer,” she said calmly.

The gust fell away, but Nyx failed to approach. “You need to get that thing out of your skull immediately, otherwise who knows what it could do.”

“She’s right, ‘Tette,” Knuckles replied. “You could be a serious threat if that thing gets out of hand.”

“I dunno, she did heal me with it just now,” Sonic replied. “Maybe she could heal her sister with it, too.” He paused as the cat took ahold of his wrist. “What’s up?” he asked.

“Take me to her,” she demanded quietly.

“What?” he asked, caught a bit off guard. “You’re really considering--”

“Take me to her, _please,_ ” the cat repeated, gritting her teeth.

Sonic nodded resolutely and picked her up before speeding off.

“W-Wait!” Tails said, but by that time Sonic was out of earshot.

“Still as stubborn and reckless as ever,” Silver said. “Even if he doesn’t know me, it seems to be a universal constant.”

Tails frowned. “Yeah, well perhaps he’s right, maybe this is the cure we’re looking for. It would certainly end this night on a happy note.” He carefully undid the ITCH communicator from around his wrist. “I finished it for you, Silver. Just as I predicted, an easy fix. I didn’t have the time to test it though since you ran off so quickly.”

“That’s alright, thank you once again,” Silver said, taking the watch back. “Though I guess for you this would be the first time.”

“Don’t worry, I get what you meant,” Tails replied with a slight grin.

Silver clicked the clasp and gently held down the button. “Hello?” Silver spoke. “Professor? Sorry about the breakup earlier. I hope these past few days haven’t alarmed you too much.”

A cheerful and relieved voice came back. “Ah, zhank goodness Silver. You had Gold and I so vorried! Do you know vhy you vere called zhere?” the Professor replied.

“Turns out that someone foresaw a disaster. Not sure if it has anything to do with the Genesis portals, so we can relax there, but I don’t think I’m gonna be able to get back for a few days,” Silver replied.

“Hm? And vhy is zhat?” Von Schlemmer asked.

“Well, how do I put it?” Silver swallowed his spit and continued. “The person who brought me here explained a few things about how the portal works. Let’s just say that when the portal opens, it uses all of the water in the pool to manifest the person coming through. Usually the water boils off and it takes time to replenish.”

“So you’ll be stuck zhere until you can get back.” The sound of something getting knocked over in the background sounded from the speaker, and for a brief moment Silver heard the Professor shouting in a language he didn’t quite understand before settling back into the calm tone of voice before. “Vell, I’ll pass on zhe good news to Gold, she’ll be zhrilled to know you’re safe!”

Just then, the moth girl clutched her head and shouted, and the sound sent the Professor panicking. “Silver, what’s wrong vith--”

“I’ll handle it,” the hedgehog replied. “Just make sure to tell Gold I said hello. I’m counting on you.” He clicked off the communicator and carefully plucked the moth out of the air. “Nyx? Nyx, what is it?”

“I saw the visions again,” she said. “They’re getting stronger. We have to get back there and remove that stone from her head, _ASAP._ ”

* * *

Shadow frowned as the medic began jotting down something in a small pocket book in the backseat of the truck. They were on their way to Headquarters, and while Rouge was quietly humming a tune while adjusting her weaponized gloves and Omega sat and was in Sleep Mode to conserve his energy, Shadow’s discomfort with the silence left him staring at the only interesting sight in the car.

Sylphic had his legs crossed at the ankles, right over left, and was tapping a blue pencil against the edge of his lip as he gazed at the page with a pair of rounded spectacles. He carefully pushed the reading specs up the bridge of his nose as he continued his thought process, but stopped again as his eyes locked on those of the other hybrid in the car.

“Um, Shadow? Do you mind?” Sylphic asked.

“What?” Shadow said, snapping to attention.

“You’re staring,” the medic replied. “I take it you’re wondering what I’m working on?”

“Yeah, what is that?” Shadow asked.

“It’s a log. I keep it up to date as best I can,” Sylphic replied, holding it up to show the pages. “I actually have a portion of the shelf back at the apartment dedicated tothem now. I’ve recorded each day of my life as meticulously as possible.”

“You really still have all the bells and whistles, don’t you?” Shadow replied. “Analytical, detail-oriented.”

“That part of me never changed and probably never will, Shadow,” Sylphic replied. “But I’m not just doing this for fun. This is a failsafe.”

“What for? Aren’t you immortal, like me?” Shadow asked.

“I actually have no idea if Gerald…” he paused for a moment and shook his head. “Sorry, every time I say that name I get reminded.”

“Go on anyways.”

“Right, well… I have no idea if he programmed my physiology to handle hits like he could with yours. Your Black Arms blood makes you difficult to destroy, but I don’t have Black Arms in me. The only DNA in me that isn’t Sonic or Knuckles’ is that of a Chao, and while it certainly makes some sense that such an agent would be able to properly stabilize into something, a Chao is _definitely_ not immortal.”

“I mean, isn’t Chaos a chao?” Shadow asked.

“A mutated one, yes,” Sylphic replied. “I ran a few tests to indicate that.”

Shadow smirked and crossed his arms, wondering when the medic had the time to do that. “And?” he asked. “The Chaos drives that the Professor used produced Artificial Chaos all those years ago, they are a simulation of that. You have that in your body.”

“That’s the thing though- I can get hurt. I can be affected by toxic gasses and horrible scrape-ups, even if my ability to bounce back is quick to kick in. Chaos can’t really be killed.” He finished jotting down notes. “Chao might not die of accidents or injuries, but they die of old age. And since I’m only one-third of that, I don’t even know if that's true.”

“But why exactly are you writing if you’re going to die?” Shadow asked. He felt a lump in his throat upon those words but shoved it down with a violent but stealthy gulp. 

“Because Chao also regenerate, but with the caveat that their pseudo-progeny don’t remember anything,” Sylphic explained. “Therefore, logically, I am writing things down in case that’s exactly what’s going to happen.”

Shadow nodded. “Alright, I think I understand now.”

“If I had any of the details to my old tech, I could have possibly created a more useful means to store those memories, much like how he created me in the first place.” Sylphic sighed. “Unfortunately, that research was likely blown up on Prison Island thanks to your little excursion with Ivo.”

“Hey, I couldn’t have known that was there!” Shadow grumbled. “You know I wasn’t in the best state of mind either.”

“Relax, I’m teasing,” Sylphic said. “You know I understand that well. Even so, that was a lot of property damage. How did you even manage to get your record wiped clean enough to become an agent?”

“It was a message Gerald left me on the ARK. Somebody managed to access it and broadcast it worldwide. I saw it, citizens saw it, and… well, the G.U.N. Commander himself saw it. He… he had my name on his hit list for so long. You remember the little boy who was friends with Maria, right?”

“The one with heterochromia?” Sylphic asked. “It’s foggy, but… I suppose that’s another memory I’m surprised has remained. He became the Commander of G.U.N.?”

“Sounds crazy considering that his family passed away in the raid, huh?” Shadow said. “Still, he invited me over after the Black Arms incident ended.”

“Did you go?” Sylphic asked, folding up his spectacles and placing his journal in his lap. 

“If anyone knows the value of closure, it’s me,” Shadow said. “He has a granddaughter of his own now, she’s about a year as of last May. I’ll give you three guesses as to her name, and believe me, you won’t need two of them.”

Sylphic smirked. “Is he still the Commander?” he asked.

“Yes, but he’s reaching an age where he’d like to retire. There’s a promising one willing to take his place, but… he might be a little bit too preppy for my tastes,” Shadow replied. “Oh, it looks like we are heading into HQ. Hope you brought something to keep you busy- the visit’s gonna suck.”

“How can you tell?”

“Just a hunch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be out of town from Thursday, July 30th, 2020 until the late evening of August 2nd, 2020. It's a family tradition to go camping and I have been neglecting that tradition the past two years due to unsavory living conditions. Now that I'm out of those conditions, I'm free to go. I apologize if this disrupts my already slightly erratic upload schedule, but ever fic writers need a break every once in a while.
> 
> Happy trails, stay safe out there, everyone!
> 
> \--Chrome


	6. An Omen in Opalite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bastette finds out the extent of the Opal's powers and the implications are absolutely terrifying. Meanwhile, Sylphic comes across a familiar face at G.U.N. HQ...

Cream left with her mother by the time Sonic had brought the cat back to Amy’s home. He casually waved the two of them goodbye before looking back to the birthday girl. “Alright, we’re here.”

Bastette leapt out of Sonic’s arms and ran through the front door of the house, searching for her sister. “Briar?” she cried.

Amy caught her and steadied her. “Whoa, Bastette, what’s up with that gem in your head?” she asked. “I mean, it’s cute, but it looks a little spooky, too.”

The cat grinned and eerily shifted her eyes to Amy, a movement that made the pink hedgehog squirm a bit in discomfort and frown. “Amy, I found the cure to her illness, now she can get better.”

The hedgehog paused. “But didn’t Sylphic say that NIDS was incurable?”

“Yeah, but,” she paused and pointed to the Opal. “This thing might be able to reverse it! I can fix this!” She had a look in her eyes that she felt was eager, but Amy was clearly uncomfortable under.

“Bastette, are you okay? You’re really antsy, maybe you should think clearly before--”

Briar came shuffling into the living room. “Sissy?” she said. “Why did you go?”

The cat smiled and knelt by her sister, and Amy shuffled over to Sonic. “Is she okay? How is she going to ‘fix’ this, exactly?” she asked.

“Ames, she gave me a concussion and then healed it with that rock she has,” Sonic said. “I’ll bet she can use it to wish her illness away.”

Bastette hugged her sister, who was reaching for the gem. The new adult firmly gripped Briar’s hand when she got close- a little  _ too _ tight, in fact. “Alright, Briar, get ready,” she said, slowly standing.

Briar wrestled her arm away and stepped back a few paces. “O-okay.”

Amy felt a chill go down her spine, and she stepped forward. “Bastette, maybe we should wait until we have a second opin--”

“Wait a minute, Amy, please,” Bastette said. “I just want her to live and not be sick anymore.”

Amy hissed as her feet froze in place. “What the… how are you doing that?” she said.

Sonic frowned. “Bastette, unfreeze her right now!” he said.

“I’ll get that in a minute, first I have to cure my sister,” the cat said. There was a chill in her voice as she turned back. “Alright, here we--”

“S-Sissy?” Briar said. “I don’t… feel so good…”

“That’s okay, that feeling will go away really soon, I promise,” she replied. “Just be a little bit patient.”

“No, that’s not what I mean. I feel something in my feet.”

Bastette looked down to her sister’s feet. “What’s wrong with them, they seem fine.” As she reached within an inch, she yelped as a small display of milky crystalline spikes exuded from beneath the little cat’s feet. “What on Earth is…”

The crystals began to grow upwards, coating every inch of Briar’s legs as the effect rippled up her skin slowly. Briar screamed, but when she tried to move her legs, she only fell over and hit her head against the carpet. “S-Sissy!” she shouted. 

“Briar, what’s… I don’t understand!” Bastette said. She tried to reach out to her sister, but Sonic grabbed her arms and held her back. “What are you doing?” she hissed.

“If she grabs you and she continues to turn to stone, you’ll probably break off her arms!” Sonic shouted, trying to overrule the screaming with his voice. He clenched his jaw and pulled with as much strength as he could to keep her from moving forward. “You’ll hurt her more if you do that.”

Bastette narrowed her eyes and swung her hand, leaving a cut on Sonic's cheek with one of her claws. He hissed at the pain, but continued to hold onto her, determined not to make it worse by being entangled with her sister. It wasn't long before another scrath hit his cheek below the first and the cat turned her attention on him.

Briar cried, letting out a last scream as her face froze over, and her face faceted like a gem. A quick puff of silver dust exited her nose, and then… silence.

Amy stumbled forward, finally able to move again, and she used that mobility to come to Sonic’s aid. Bastette was now straddled over Sonic, a horribly angry and wild stare in her eyes, while the teen was desperately trying to avoid her hands gripping beneath his chin. Amy summoned her hammer and took a warning swing. “Back off, ‘Tette, you’re outta control!”

Bastette stared at her and stood up before running over to the lifeless statue her sister had become. “Oh no, please no, not like this.” She looked up as though she could see the gem on her forehead. “Right, the Eye! I wanna undo this!”

She looked at her sister. Nothing. The little girl’s eyes were still anguished and made of stone.

“Come on, work!” she said, standing up. Her breathing was getting heavier, and she clutched her shoulders as though she were cold and hunched over. “Why won’t you make her live again? I wanted her to live!”

Tails and the remaining team clambered through the front door. “Bastette, what are you doing? What did--” He stopped short as he saw Briar lying on the floor. His eyes widened and searched about, trying to comprehend exactly what had just happened.

Nyx tumbled through them all and spoke loud and clear. “The Opal doesn’t respond to wishes in any constructive manner, cat! You’ve made a horrible mistake.”

Tails pulled out his cell and began rapidly typing something out.

“I can see that!” Bastette yelled. Tears poured down her cheeks and she shook violently. “I want her back, I want her to be alive now, and I… I…”

She collapsed and covered her face, sobbing as she stared at the remnants of what was her only family before her. Everything felt like static, as though her mind were wading through a thick soup of thought with no end in sight. Her arms were numb, her legs were numb;  _ everything _ was numb. And all the while that she felt nothing she seemed to feel everything at the same time- every pinprick syllable became a clip-point dagger to her back.

Sonic carefully and hesitantly moved towards her. “Bastette, we can still fix this, maybe if it shatters, it’ll bring your sister back.” Sonic offered his hand.

Bastette shakily stood without his aid and went out back to the patio. She began pawing at the bricks on the patio and tapping with her knuckles for the right sound.

Tails tilted his head. “What are you doing?”

“Exactly what he suggested, I’m going to destroy this thing.” She breathed in and went to slam her head against the bricks, but as her head reached within an inch of the ground, it stopped and her neck went stiff. 

The team wrestled their way outside and stared. Silver piped up. “Um… what are you waiting for?”

“I’m trying to, I just…” Bastette’s eyes welled up with tears again as she pushed her head down, only managing to make it within a centimeter before forcing herself upright again. She stared at the group and shamefully looked away. “I can’t do it!”

“Why not?” Nyx adamantly asked. Her defensive posture and wide stance weren’t helping the situation any. 

“If she goes back to normal, she’ll just be sick again!”

“If she doesn’t go back to normal, she’ll be a statue forever!” Sonic said. “Don’t you get that?”

“ _Shut up!_ ” Bastette said. “ _Shut up!_ Stop pretending like you have everything figured out, just because you have your life put together _so_ perfectly and have so many friends to support you! I’ve always had to be my own support,  _ always! _ ” She clenched her fist. “You’d never understand that, none of you would. I “get that”-  _ you don’t!” _

Sonic tried to open his mouth, but it seemed that her command had stuck. He clawed at his lower lip but it stayed as shut as a window in winter. His eyes widened and he stared at her as she stood to face him and stepped forward.

“I worked so hard this past year and a half trying to keep my sister safe. I can’t even think about the close calls three months ago without feeling sick.” She gripped Sonic’s shoulder, her claws slightly digging into him as she failed to contain her rage. She came close to his ear in a moment of pure, blind loathing at the blue-blur’s constant optimism and hoarsely muttered in an angry and haunted tone.

“If you knew even a sliver of how hard it’s been, you’d cry too.” Her eyes glanced to the rest of the team. “All of you would.”

The phone Tails was holding clattered to the ground and he held his head. “I…”

Sonic looked over at Tails, voice still muffled by his inability to open his mouth. His eyes widened as he saw the crystals at his feet. “Mmmmph!” he cried. 

The fox looked down and widened his eyes. “Bastette, make it stop!” he yelled. “You’re turning me to---”

Bastette began panicking again as the crystals reached his waist and her voice returned from its dark resting place. “Tails? No, not you too, I…”

Tails swallowed hard and nodded resolutely. “It’ll be okay, just…” He sharply inhaled as the crystals spread to his arms and up to his neck. “It’s okay to feel--”

The rest of him crystalized mid-sentence, and he began to teeter before falling to his left.

Sonic, through the pain, managed to break through the spell and shouted. His voice ripped through the night air in an uncharacteristically anguished manner. “Tails!” he screamed, jumping to his best friend’s form and grabbing the falling statue before it reached the ground. He groaned and looked over to the group as he struggled to hold it up. “Knuckles, a little help here?” he called.

The echidna ran over and hoisted Tails back up. Sonic felt at his friend’s face, and hissed as he watched a single line of water on the edge of the boy’s left eye trickle down his cheek, drip into a tear, crystalize mid-drop and shatter on impact on the cold red brick.

Sonic’s hands were shaking, and he hunched over slightly and held his stomach. “Bastette…” he hoarsely called. “Why did you…” He stood up and widened his stance and frowned, and it was the hardest he’d  _ ever _ frowned. He was still shaking, and as Knuckles spotted the look on his face, he struggled to hide his own fear.

_ “I’m going to rip that thing from your forehead whether you like it or not,” _ the hedgehog said, stepping forward. His tone sent shivers down everyone’s spine including his own, but unfortunately Sonic could only barely tell through the blind rage of watching his best friend suffer in front of him. 

Knuckles grabbed his arm. “Wait,” he said. 

Sonic pulled his arm away. “Don’t stop me,” the hedgehog said.  _ “Please.” _

“Sonic, he’s still alive,” Knuckles said. “It’s not a strong signal, but… I can read him like I can with the Master Emerald. He’s still alive in there, he’s just frozen like he’s asleep.”

Sonic noticed how his breathing had been more heavy and held a hand to his chest to calm himself down. “Okay, so he’s still alive, which means--”

Bastette began laughing. Sonic squirmed a bit, clearly disturbed that anyone could produce such a sound in a crisis like this, and walked over to her. The cat responded with a sharp crystalline spike shooting from around her heels up towards the hedgehog’s throat.

“She’s still alive, and since she’s crystal, she will never get sick,” she said. “She’ll never have to die to that sickness.”

“Bastette,” Sonic said. “She might be alive, but she isn’t able to move. How is she supposed to do all the things kids do?”

The cat paused and looked down. “I can’t lose her. Not like I did to the rest of my family. She’s all I have left.”

Silver felt a buzz from his ITCH and pressed the response button. “Hello, professor? We have a bit of a situation here. It’s not exactly the best time to---”

“Schilver, zhings aren’t looking so good here eizher,” the Professor replied from the other end. “It’s Gold. She just turned to crystal! Vhat’s happening over zhere?”

Silver went quiet.

“Schilver? Hello?” the Professor called.

The white hedgehog’s teal aura began to glow around him, and he floated forward and landed behind the cat. Bastette turned to look at him and saw that his eyes had gone completely white. “U-um, hi, I--”

“Undo this,” Silver said, his voice even colder than Bastette’s was before. “Now.”

Bastette looked him up and down, and at least ten seconds of silence passed before she answered. 

“No.”

Silver’s fist clenched and he slammed his foot down, creating a clean hole in the patio. “Undo this or I’ll be forced to do it  _ for  _ you!”

Bastette responded with a widened stance. “I won’t let you make my sister sick again!” she screamed. Her voice sent a shockwave towards Silver and slammed him into the house, his limp body crashing through several layers of wall before coming to a complete stop on the adjacent street out front. He tried to get up, but his arms shook too much and he failed to prop himself up.

From below her, the ground started rumbling, and Knuckles felt a massive spike in energy around them all. “We gotta get outta here!” he yelled. “This place is gonna--”

A few crystalline shards began jutting from the ground left and right, and Knuckles went into overdrive by hoisting Tails over his shoulder and beginning his mad sprint away from the house. Sonic hurriedly scooped up Amy in his arms out of instinct. He gave her his usual “don’t get any ideas” look as he carried her further away, but she only nodded in understanding instead of her own usual pining gaze.

Nyx flew over to Silver and grimaced as she tried to lift him up off the ground. “Silver, you’re really heavy,” she said.

“Do what you did with the pebbles,” he flatly said, still unable to move much.

“Oh, right,” she said. As the spikes followed the team out and headed towards them, Nyx panickedly threw her arms up and extended her aura to him before lifting him off the ground. “Geez, even with my powers, you’re heavy,” she muttered.

“You just need practice,” Silver replied. “Oh and  _ thanks…” _

* * *

Meanwhile, bureaucracy wasn’t going so great. The first few hoops had already been jumped, but now the team was about to go in front of the G.U.N. council. Shadow gestured to Sylphic for his canteen and took a swig of water as he eyed the guards escorting them to the room down the hall.

“This is the most you talk to anybody, isn’t it?” the hybrid asked.

“Yep,” the black hedgehog replied. “And I tend to hate every minute I’m in that room. It’s cold and unfriendly.”

“That’s a weird way of describing a room, but I get what you mean.” Sylphic sighed. “Rouge, how exactly is this going to work again? I mean, they know Shadow doesn’t call bluffs.”

“Shadow doesn’t, but I do, if that makes sense,” she said. 

“But they also would know you’re a compulsive liar, wouldn’t that work against you?”

Rouge scoffed a bit. “It would, but we’ve managed to find a way to make it work,” she said. “A way that’ll put them into a Catch 22. You wanna hear it?” 

“No, not particularly, who knows what means this information could be used. In fact, I’m not sure why you’re even discussing the plan out loud.”

“You asked her first,” Omega said, clunking his way down the hall. “Did you forget already?”

Shadow smirked. “Omega, lay off him, he’s three months old,” he said. 

“I recall you telling me he was an old man before,” Omega said. “Now you aren’t making any sense.”

“Well, both are technically correct,” Sylphic said. “It’s a complicated concept.”

“Would you stop bickering over specifics, you’re all gonna give me a headache,” Rouge said. “Though that might have been from the coffee I took half an hour ago.”

Shadow nodded. “I could use some coffee right about now, I’m tired and cranky.”

“You’re  _ always _ tired and cranky,” Rouge said.

“Then I guess I  _ always  _ need coffee,” Shadow replied.

“I don’t think coffee is gonna fix the latter but it’s a decent fix for the former,” Sylphic replied.

Shadow gave him a cold stare. Rouge snickered in the background, and Omega didn’t have protocol to laugh but definitely would have had he been given that. Sylphic shot a grin back. “Hey, gotta step up my wit game somehow, right?” he asked.

“Don’t overshoot it. Brevity is wit.”

“And so is actual wit, Shadow.”

“A equals A, congrats,” Shadow said.

“Here,” Sylphic replied, reaching into the pouch on his belt. “Maybe this’ll help.” He held out a pill.

“What’s that?” Shadow asked, suspicious of the capsule. 

“It’s an experimental caffeine pill I’ve been working on,” the medic said. “Well, caffeine and probiotics.”

“I’m not exactly a guinea pig here,” Shadow said. “How will you know I’ll be okay?”

“I engineered it for those sick feelings you’ve been getting recently.” He paused. “I don’t think those are supposed to be happening. Even though I knew most of your physiology, you still have a few things that have been surprising me. Clearly Gerald didn’t get everything documented, so I suppose I have to pick up where he left off.”

Shadow paused before he gingerly took the pill and popped it in his mouth and then took another gulp of water. “There, you happy?” he said.

“Yeah, I am, and you should be alright in about ten to fifteen minutes, depending on your metabolism.”

Shadow sighed and handed the canteen back. “Alright, we’re here. Try not to react too harshly.”

As the doors at the end of the hall slid open upon their approach, Sylphic could make out the gentle whispers of the council reconvening. He wasn’t entirely sure how they’d react considering the time of the night they’d arrived, but he could only imagine it wasn’t going to be joyful.

He was wrong. As he entered the room, a shrewd voice perked up. “Ah, so I see the escapee has finally returned from his little joyride. Welcome back, Professor.”

Sylphic’s stomach swirled, and he looked to the team. “Which one of you told them?”

Rouge sighed. “Guilty as charged.”

“Why would you tell them that? I thought I made it clear that--”

“Syll,” Shadow said. “You ought to greet them.”

“Ugh,  _ fine, _ ” the hybrid said. He turned his gaze on the Council, who sat around them in a semicircle on a raised platform. Then again, he was short, so everything was raised to him. “It’s just Sylphic. No need for epithets. How can I help you?” He had to hold himself back from letting his voice drip with contempt.

“You’re the one that came to us, Gerald,” the speaker replied. His voice was still bright, but the contents were beginning to seriously get on the medic’s nerves.

Shadow put a hand on his shoulder and stepped forward. “With all due respect, Captain Briggs,” he said. “He doesn’t go by that name anymore. He cast that name aside three months ago. Surely you can respect that, knowing your own history with name changes.”

Sylphic perked up at that name, but stayed quiet a bit longer.

“He doesn’t even have a government-issued ID,” Briggs said, leaning a bit closer. It became a little bit easier to see him. He was a gaunt gentleman with a pair of warm green eyes that mismatched a generally cold looking demeanor, pale skin and a prominent scar along the left side of his mouth. He itched at his pepper-gray buzz-cut. “How are we to address him properly without the appropriate paperwork?” he asked Shadow.

“Actually,” Omega chimed in, “his records were updated this morning.”

Briggs pursed his lips. “Very well… ‘Sylphic’. Agent Shadow has been adamant that you have an audience with us, so please explain why you’ve called us here.”

“I need access to my--” he caught himself and steadied his breath. “To Gerald’s research on Project Shadow,” the medic said.

“That’s some seriously high-level security,” Briggs said. “What makes you believe that I can just trust you with that information?”

“I mean,” Sylphic said. “You trusted me with that chalk all those years ago, didn’t you?” he replied.

“What?” Briggs replied, taken out of his professional demeanor for a moment. “Are you Gerald or not?”

“I  _ was _ , but I’m a bit different now. But I still remember a lot. If you don’t feel you can trust me, Devon, perhaps you should accompany us to the location of the research just to be safe.”

Shadow bristled. “Syll, you can’t be talking to the Captain like--”

“Wait,” Briggs said, holding his hand up. “You… remember me?”

“Clear as day, the scar was a tell, but your eyes gave it away more than anything,” Sylphic said. “Never understood how someone’s eyes could be so optimistic, to be honest. I figured it was probably related to how your pupils were always slightly larger than average and the limbal ring around the edge of your iris always kept you looking years younger than your age. But hey, that’s just my opinion.”

Rouge frowned. “You’re not exactly being formal about this.”

Briggs paused. “What exactly do you want with this research? You aren’t planning to build a bioweapon, are you?”

“As fun as Gerald would have had with that in his later years, I’m afraid I’ll have to pass. I have to access the research on his granddaughter’s condition- we have a case of NIDS that has cropped up. I’d show you the impromptu blood work I started on the case but you confiscated my bag along with the sample.”

Rouge sighed. “Listen, the kid’s really little and her sister is desperate for a solution, could you please just have a heart for her?” Rouge asked. “I swear on my life that I’m being honest.”

“We understand that your track record isn’t clean on that sort of promise,” Briggs said.

“Which is why I second her promise,” Shadow said. “Will hearing it from me be enough for you?”

Briggs put a hand on his chin. “Omega, are you going to chime in?” he asked.

“I have no need, my calculations have determined your response already.”

Briggs sighed. “Council, you’re all dismissed.”

“But sir, we haven’t even voted…” a voice chimed in.

“That’s an order, I’ll deal with the bureaucracy. Besides, this is much too interesting to just let it slip away. I’ll escort them, tell the Commander I have this matter to attend to first and foremost, and tell him Shadow is involved. He’ll understand.”

As the rest of the Council slowly shuffled out, the Captain stepped down and slowly approached the hybrid. He knelt down, trying to properly be at eye level, but the hybrid crossed his arms. “So the scar really gave it away, huh?” he asked.

Sylphic chuckled. “Still have the same speech pattern when you aren’t sitting through those boring meetings as well.”

“I know, right?” Briggs said, relieved he didn’t have to keep putting on the act. “If I’d known it would be  _ this  _ boring, I’d have stayed a guard my whole life. At least there’s some action there. Here it’s just boring briefings and paperwork.”

“Betcha the barbeques are nice though.”

“Yeah, when my colleagues aren’t making fools of themselves playing cornhole,” Briggs said. “Anyways, the research?” he asked.

“You aren’t going to make sure I don’t have anything up my sleeve?” the medic asked.

“You aren’t wearing a shirt,” Devon chuckled, standing back up. “Plus, I get what this research meant to you. Consider yourself lucky I’m in charge.”

Shadow looked between the two of them. “Mind telling me how you two know each other?” he asked.

“Oh, Devon?” Sylphic said. “He was Gerald’s buddy. Well,  _ guard _ , but still a buddy. Only guy who seemed to show the man any kindness on Prison Isle.”

“Heh, he’d get so lonely around noon when I’d go on lunch break and by 1 PM I’d be running back to check in on him.”

“You kept apologizing over and over that one time you didn’t get back until 1:05,” Sylphic said. “Well, now that you’re helping us out, I suppose you should lead the way.”

“Right,” Briggs said, stiffening his back. “This way.”

Sylphic was a little more at ease knowing that somebody here knew him, or at least knew the old him. It was a strange sort of comfort that lingered in the back of his mind like a gentle reminder of the good of humanity. He grinned.

“So, what  _ did  _ you get from your grandson, anyways?” Briggs asked, breaking the silence as the crew continued down the hallway. 

“Well, Ivo used a few Chaos Emeralds to deliver a package of blood samples back into the past, and those, well…” He gestured to himself. “Wild, right?”

“How did he manage to put you together in so little time?” he asked. “He was executed nine months later.”

“Never leave a genius alone for that long,” Sylphic said. “He was bound to find some way and he did, and that’s all that matters.”

“And the memories? Why did he give you those?” he said.

“I’m unsure how intentional it was but in the process of giving me his desires of revenge I guess his remaining sanity got copied over as well. In a sense I’m a continuation of his consciousness. Though I don’t really care for that old name- I know I’m not him, or at least not the him that the name belongs to. It would be disrespectful to the dead, y’know?”

Briggs nodded. “So, Sylphic… geez, that’s an interesting name you chose… who exactly is this girl you spoke about?”

“A young one named Briar, probably only 5 or 6. Her sister is her only surviving family, the rest passed away during the Black Arms incident,” he said. He frowned as he watched Shadow clench one of his fists slightly. “It’s still a sore subject.”

Briggs nodded. “Well, it’s still a bit of a walk, but we can talk about other things in the meantime.”

“Yes, I think that would be nice.” Sylphic gave a light chuckle. “It’s… good to see you again, Devon.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back, lovelies! Sorry for the wait, I just had to get the work done and the emotional intensity definitely took a lot outta me. Regardless of the past, though, I'm prepared to hop back onto the saddle and keep the update train rollin'.


	7. The Tower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Shadow words send Bastette over the edge, he comes face to face with a new and more personal terror. Meanwhile, the rest of the Team resolves to reach Bastette by any means necessary.

“And here we are,” Briggs said. “Most of the research is here and in the other room next door.” He carefully swiped his card through the pinpad and waited for the lock to unclick from its holder before the door slid open. “Honestly, this is all still so surreal.”

“I understand, Devon,” Sylphic said. “I have to ask though- how has your family been doing? Last time I checked, you were having some trouble finding a lady to settle down with.”

Devon nervously chuckled. “Heh, yeah…”

As the Team entered the room, Sylphic got acquainted with Gerald’s old machinery. His fingers danced along the rivets of the now ancient and near-obsolete tech as he examined the contents of the lab room.

Sylphic nodded as he came over to what appeared to be some sort of chemistry-grade cooler. “I understand. Do you two have any kids?”

“Couldn’t conceive, so we adopted. She's a teenager, and her name’s Jolt. She was orphaned last year.” He paused. “Well, she’s old enough to vote now. Maybe I shouldn’t call her a teen anymore.”

“Black Arms?” the medic asked.

Briggs nodded. “Central City during the bomb retrieval. She dealt with a lot of broken bones. We weren’t even sure that she’d make it, but…” he cut himself off as he wrestled a black and white photo from his pockets. “Here, I can just show you. Sorry, Caleb’s obsessed with old-timey sorts of filters.”

Sylphic gingerly plucked the picture and took a look at it. In it were both parents standing over their child- it was Devon, another man, and a young cat girl whose hair was up in a short set of spiky pigtails. “She looks so happy,” Sylphic said. “Nothing happier than seeing family proper like that.”

“Well, we do our best. She still has a lot of issues to work through. We got her going through therapy and everything, and she’s nearly done with her group. I’m…” he paused, pursing his lips and sniffling a little. “I’m so proud of her, she never would have taken the initiative if she’d been alone.”

Sylphic was lost in thought at the photo. Perhaps it was because he hadn’t seen many cats, but something was off about Jolt. “Hmm.”

“Is something the matter?” Briggs asked.

“Oh? No, not at all,” the medic replied. He held the photo out. “Here.”

“Oh, you can hang onto that,” Briggs said.

“But it’s yours.”

“I have another two or three in my pocket. I’m just really proud of my family. I like to show us off whenever I reconnect with someone.”

Shadow rolled his eyes a bit but watched as a soldier came down the hall carrying a familiar sidebag. “It’s here.”

“Excellent, let’s get to work,” Sylphic said as he received it. “Rouge, I can’t get into the cooler, the password slipped my mind. Think you can break in?” he asked.

“Like taking candy from a baby,” the bat replied. “Did you mean I should hack it or just take my foot to it?”

“Please don’t kick it, there are some volatile things in there that I need to pull this off.” He grabbed his bag and began rummaging around, pausing as he laid his eyes on a glittering stone in one of the pockets. His stomach dropped, wondering how it had even ended up in there.

He did his best not to pay it too much mind as he fished around more, finally grinning as his hands grazed the lid of the blood sample he’d taken. He quickly stood up and marched to the nearby microscope before dragging a stool over and clambering up to the seat. “Rouge, how’s that cooler?”

“Five letter password? Really?” Rouge said. “Was this protection made by a 3-year-old?”

“Yeah in retrospect maybe a better password should have been chosen.” Sylphic carefully took a sample of the blood and placed it on a slide. He heard a click from the cooler as it opened, but his head stayed unturned as he examined the sample. “Alright, figuring out the details should be a snap. Rouge, I need a blue test-tube labeled “028-MR4”. Do you see it?”

“Maybe?” Rouge said, reaching her hand in. “Why is it so tall? And why is it so cold in this thing?”

“It’s built for humans, not us,” Sylphic replied. “Besides, if memory serves, the last time they had a cooler that size, a certain someone stole a few samples under the impression that they were some sort of drink.” He eyed Shadow.

“I was a newborn, I didn’t know any better,” Shadow scoffed. He shivered as the cold hit him. “I second Rouge- why would Gerald need to freeze anything that low?”

“A lot of biological things are preserved better as precipitates in ethanol. Usually it only lasts a week or so, but at -164° Centigrade it could last more than 50 years.”

Shadow paused. “50 years?”

Rouge grinned. “Yes, here it is.” She plucked out a small cylinder. “028-MR4, date drawn June 22, year 19…” her voice trailed off.

“What’s wrong?” Shadow asked.

“Looks like the year’s been redacted.”

Sylphic nodded. “I don’t know how the bureaucracy has changed to make that happen, but it doesn’t matter- you can store it for decades and I know when he started collecting samples.” He gently took the tube and thanked Rouge. “Omega, right?” he asked, staring at the robot.

 _“Affirmative,”_ Omega replied. 

“I need you to pull up the data entries on Project Shadow. Whatever we have at our disposal will be of use. If it’s okay with you, get those printed to the nearest secure station.”

 _“Do you not already have knowledge of Project Shadow, given the earlier explanation?”_ he asked.

“My knowledge has gaps.” Sylphic pulled a pen out of his bag along with his notebook from his belt. “Human memory isn’t as concrete as it sounds- it’s why we lose our train of thought. A lot of the details on the Project were probably lost during the memory transfer.”

As he furiously scribbled in the notebook, he took a hard swallow. “AB+ Blood, good RBC count, low cholesterol...” He flicked his finger against the light to power down the microscope as he finished a few more notes. “Alright, I have the basics, now to research the files.”

Briggs nodded. “I’ll go get ready for the pages, just don’t go anywhere.”

“Thanks, Captain Briggs,” Sylphic said. “Forgive me for being so informal earlier.” He set the photo into his notebook and looked at it again.

“Hey, I missed you too, even if you’re different than him,” he said. 

“Well, you’re about to help us make history.”

As the council member ran down the hall, Shadow turned back toward the medic. “So explain what’s in the vial anyway…” 

Sylphic carefully held the vial to the hedgehog. “This is a DNA sample. _Her_ sample, in fact.”

Shadow gawked ever so slightly. “So that’s… how long did he keep it?” 

Sylphic paused. “50 years at least, obviously. And the coding system he put in place...” The medic racked his brain as he got down and pushed the stool further down the counter, where a scanning machine stood. After climbing back onto the stool he ran his finger along the dusty frame of the old machinery. “Oh Bertha, I missed you…” he said quietly. “Sorry, I got caught up in the moment.”

Shadow raised an eye. “You name your machines, too? Geez, seems like it really runs in the family.”

“Yeah, well it all circles back, doesn’t it?” He powered up the machine and began preparing the precipitate for machine examination. “This DNA should have been taken from another blood sample.”

Rouge jumped as her phone buzzed. She unlocked it and began typing, and after a moment her face turned to terror.

“What’s wrong?” Shadow asked, gliding over to her. 

“It’s Tails,” she said. “He sent a text but he’s still texting.”

Shadow squinted and stared at the screen. “What does he mean by that? “Things went south”? That’s vague, not at all like him.”

“I don’t know, my signal’s poor here. He could’ve sent this one minute ago or half an hour ago.”

Then, there came a longer buzz. The call was from Tails, and Rouge frowned, wondering what this was about. Whatever it was, she wasn’t willing to put up with the onslaught alone. She set it to speaker and jacked up the volume.

“Tyke, you better have a good reason for—“

“Hey, Rouge,” a feminine voice called. “I have good news.”

Sylphic paused what he was doing with the machine and turned around. “Bastette? Is that you? We have you on speaker.”

“That’s great! And you don’t have to worry about searching for a cure anymore, too!” she said. Her voice seemed oddly dissonant for her subject, opting to sound high-strung and desperate, nothing within the realm of content.

“What’s going on? Why are you calling from Tails’ phone?” Shadow asked.

“He left it here…” A short giggle sounded from the distance of Bastette’s end of the phone. “I need your help, but I also don’t think you should help. Isn’t that crazy?”

Sylphic finished prepping and set the machine to scan before jumping off the stool. “What’s happening over there, and why are you acting so strange?”

The camera function on the phone blinked on, showing nothing but Bastette sitting in a room of blue-pink crystal. Her voice had been echoing off the walls- she was the one giggling behind the scenes. Nestled in her forehead was a Black Opal.

Sylphic hissed as he remembered the incident three months ago and clutched his own forehead. The burning pain that went along with that monstrous form was something he felt sick at the thought of. “Bastette, what are you doing? What is that thing?”

Bastette’s face rested into a loose and worn-out expression, and her smile disappeared. “It’s another Eye, Sylphic.”

“What are you talking about?” he replied. He looked into his bag, where the blue-black stone glinted in the fluorescent light. “There’s more than one of—“

“I can’t get it out of my forehead…” Bastette reached for it, but screamed as her hand retracted from its approach. She clutched her head and groaned. “But that’s okay…”

Shadow frowned. “That thing is dangerous.”

“Wait,” the medic said. “What did you mean when you said we didn’t have to look for a cure?”

Bastette’s face bounced back to a grin. “See for yourself,” she said, turning the camera, where a vaguely Briar-shaped cluster of crystals lay motionless on the sleek floor of the room.

Rouge put a hand over her mouth, unable to bring any sounds resembling words together. Usually in the sight of specimens that big she’d be in a different kind of shock, but here the cocktail of emotions all pointed to fear, disgust, and dagger-tipped sorrow. She shakily brought her hand back down, and did her best to form something in the empty air. “Is she…?”

“Nope!” Bastette said. “Knuckles said she’s still alive in there, just… frozen, you know?” She chuckled half-heartedly. 

Shadow swallowed bile that had risen in his throat and took the phone from Rouge. “Bastette, you need to fix this immediately,” he said. His voice was guttural and cold. 

“Why? She’ll just be sick again if I change her back, and the stone knows it too so I can’t undo it even if I wanted to.” She toyed with a stray bit of her hair. “She won’t have to suffer that horrible syndrome this way.”

“‘Even if you wanted to’? She won’t get to live that way!” Shadow yelled. “You realize she’ll be a statue forever, right?”

“Yes, and I’m willing to accept that so long as she doesn’t have to suffer.”

“She _is_ suffering!” Shadow said. Rouge stepped back a little bit, nervous at how heated Shadow had become. “You aren’t even thinking about how she’s feeling, are you?” he asked.

Bastette went quiet. “What would you know about suffering?”

“Apparently more than you, cat. At least I can move past losing a loved one and act like an adult about it!”

For a few moments, the orange cat was silent, but as Shadow went to add a retort, she started giggling.

“What are you doing now?” he asked.

Rouge teetered and fell against the cooler. “Shadow…” she whispered. The hedgehog, still enraged, went to shout, but the bat spoke again, a little louder this time. “Shadow, I…”

Rouge began to glow a bright red and she panicked as she looked over herself. “Shadow, what’s going on I—“

Mid-sentence, her body evaporated, and as the cloud settled the team heard a tiny clatter against the ground.

Shadow looked down by his foot, where a pink-crystal pendant had fallen. “What the—“

Bastette shrieked over the phone. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want that to…” she stopped. “Oh, who am I kidding, you should be allowed to understand my pain. I shouldn’t apologize for that.”

Shadow impulsively threw down and stomped on the phone, breaking it beneath his foot before grabbing the pendant. He bit his lip as he examined it. “I…” he swallowed hard. “She… and…”

A flicker came from within the stone, and Shadow felt a warm sensation extend up his arm. “Is this… Chaos Energy?” 

Sylphic bit his lip. “Hang on,” he said, carefully reaching out. Shadow pulled the pendant away. 

“She’s gone, Syll,” Shadow said. His voice cracked as he cradled the gem, and he was trying harder than ever not to shake. “This is all I have left of—“

“She’s right there, Shadow,” Sylphic replied. 

“What?” Shadow said. “What do you mean?”

“Chaos Energy is nebulous and difficult to pin down a definition for, but that’s a life force you’re feeling. That stone wasn’t from Rouge- that _is_ Rouge.”

“How can you tell?” he asked, furrowing. It clearly sounded crazy to him.

“I’m not so sure myself,” the medic said. “But the good news is that she isn’t dead. She’s probably like the others who got petrified- alive but frozen.”

Shadow searched the ground as he racked his brain. His thumb caressed the pink gem and he frowned. “She can’t stay like that forever. I’m going to go take care of business.” He handed Rouge to the medic. 

“You’re not going to take her with you?” he asked. He winced as he felt Rouge’s presence rising through his arms.

“No, it’s too dangerous,” he said. “I… I don’t want her in any more danger than she already is.” He paused. “Please, she’s my friend, Syll.”

The medic nodded, and he carefully tied the pendant around his neck. “I’ll stay here and work on a cure. She’ll be safe here.”

Omega looked at the two of them. _“Shall I accompany Shadow?”_ he asked.

“Negative, at least for another hour. He should be able to handle himself.” Sylphic sighed. He paused and rolled the crystal around in his fingers. “Please don’t kill anybody, Shadow.”

Shadow frowned and turned to leave. “I will do what I must.”

As he left the room, Sylphic and Omega exchanged glances. 

_“I might not be equipped for close empathy, but perhaps Shadow could use company,”_ Omega said.

“I still need you for something, and it’s something important,” Sylphic said, watching as the scan continued. “Pull up the recent history of Jolt Briggs, I think I have an idea.”

He glanced at the photo again and nodded to himself before returning to his work.

* * *

Knuckles set the statue down as they crossed the city limits. “Alright, he should be safer here.”

Sonic frowned and knocked on the statue. “Are you sure he’s okay? Looks pretty dead to me…” He grimaced as those last words came out.

“He’s reading the same way that the Master Emerald does when we combine energies,” Knuckles said. “Just like it, Tails is a sentient hunk of rock now.”

“Can he… hear us?” Amy asked. 

“Hang on…” Knuckles squinted for a second as he tried to concentrate. “He isn’t awake, if that makes sense. It’s like he’s stuck in another world but he hasn’t come to yet.”

“Huh…” Sonic thought for a moment. “Do you think maybe it works the same way as the other one did?”

“What do you mean?” Nyx said, dropping Silver onto the ground. The white hedgehog groaned as he attempted to stand. 

“Well, Shadow said he sorta… went into Syll’s head to get the Sapphire out of him. Maybe that’s what we gotta do for Bastette?” he asked. 

The dwindled team looked to the skyline, where a massive crystalline structure overshadowed the skyscrapers and nearly pierced through the low cloud layer. The surrounding area was becoming coated with similar facets. Caught within the radius, a few people had been frozen over as well.

Nyx hissed and clutched her head. “This is exactly what I was warned about!” she yelled. She curled into a ball and began rocking. “She’s the one we have to stop, otherwise…” She began to cry from the pain, and her aura began to glow gold. “Ugh, make it stop…”

Knuckles gasped. “Wait, I think he’s waking up.”

Silver stepped over to Nyx and sighed. “It’s going to be okay,” he said, hugging her tight. “Rock as much as you need to, get it all out.”

Sonic held the statue. “Buddy, are you there?” he asked. He tried to hide the clear concern he’d had leftover from the mad dash out of the city.

“Tails, Sonic can’t hear you but I can. Are you there?” Knuckles paused, listening in. “We’re really quiet, he says, but he can definitely hear us.”

“Okay, at least that’s a relief,” Sonic said. “What’s it like in there?”

“Sonic this isn’t time to be asking stupid quest—“ He stopped mid-sentence. “He said it’s really blank, and kinda… sterile? I think that’s what I caught.”

“Sounds like a doctor’s office,” Sonic remarked.

“Actually, you aren’t far off,” Knuckles continued. “He says that he appreciates your concern, but as long as we keep him safe out here he’s gonna have a look around.”

“Not much to see when the world’s empty in there,” Sonic said.

Another pause from Knuckles. “Apparently there _are_ things in there, but when he said “blank” I guess he meant color-wise. But he’s not too worried, so you shouldn’t be either.”

Sonic was still a little uneasy, but he had to trust his best friend. After all, way too often was the fox more certain than him, and if Tails could put his trust on Sonic in a pinch, the hedgehog knew he had to do the same. “Okay, pal, sit tight. We’ll get you out of there.”

Nyx calmed down from her episode and stood up. “How are you going to stop that? She clearly has the upper hand here. She can just wish you away.”

“Well, we can’t just let her continue,” Silver said. “If we don’t stop, the whole city’s gonna be a museum exhibit.” He looked down at his ITCH and pressed the button down. “Professor, I’m back, how’s Gold holding up?”

“She’s stable, looks like she has an energy signature.”

“Good, she’s still alive too,” Silver said. “Keep her safe, we can’t have any disasters happening.”

“On it. Any idea vhat’s cause zhis to happen?” the Professor asked.

“Gonna sound a bit crazy, but there’s this gem that’s lodged in someone’s forehead, and her powers are out of control.”

“Can’t be as crazy as fighting a giant monster like a Kaiju.”

“Heh, I’m still sore from the wallop I got to the face,” Silver said. “Hey, I noticed something from earlier- there are a few extra buttons here.” His finger gingerly grazed the tops of three buttons under the watch display. 

“Right, vell,” the Professor said. “Zhe one furthest to zhe left is zhe flashlight, and zhe bulb is on zhe top of zhe device. You can press it for a quick flash or hold it down to leave it on.”

“Alright, pretty handy, what about the middle one?”

“Energy tracer.”

Silver held it down, and it produced a shrill beeping sound that pulsed every second or so. He held it towards Tails and, sure enough, the device picked up like an electrocardiogram. “Alright, _super_ useful right now. What about the last one? The one labeled BMM.” He paused. “Wait, that isn’t what I think it is, is it?” he asked.

Von Schlemmer grunted in affirmation. “It only has one charge, so use it visely. You should have about six minutes.”

“Got it, no touching that one. Take care of Gold for me.”

“Vhen you get back you two can hug it out, I’m sure.”

“Heh, yeah…” he said. A noticeable blush ran along his cheeks. “Alright I’m out. Over.”

Silver looked to Sonic. “I think we should try your plan. But how are we going to get inside her head? If Gold were here it would be a snap, but I don’t think any of us have that sort of power.”

Nyx turned away from the city and looked at him. “I’m not sure how strong my powers are, but I can try, right?” she said. “Maybe there’s some way to get in with my powers…”

Silver grinned. “Finally starting to trust yourself, huh?”

Nyx looked away. “I said I’d try, not that I’d _do._ ”

Knuckles nodded. “First things first, we need to find a place where Tails won’t be in danger. We can’t just keep lugging him around like this.”

Sonic agreed and put a hand in his best friend’s frozen shoulder. “Don’t worry, buddy, we can find a spot.”

“Doesn’t he have a workshop near the Mystic Ruins?” Amy asked. “I can keep a watch on him there.”

Knuckles paused, listening again. “That’ll have to do. It isn’t perfect but it’ll probably suffice.”

The team stood up and took one last look at the city before dashing away, set to return in as little time as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for waiting. Last Monday, Augest 10th 2020, I was hit with a the Midwest Derecho. It knocked out the power for nine days, and the WiFi is still down. A gracious friend has offered theirs to upload the rest of the chapters. The good news: I finished them all. The bad news: I am pretty sure it's longer than the last part.


	8. Into the Unknown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rouge awakens in a strange realm of white and learns of her fate, leaving Sylphic to watch after her gem. When she meets with Tails and a stranger, they plan out how they want to reach out to Bastette from within the Dreamscape. As that happens, the rest of the Team meets up with Shadow and Omega, the latter of which has joined them and the former of which drained his Chaos Powers in an effort to break through the barrier.
> 
> Little do Rouge, Tails, and Gold know that a stranger looms overhead or what that stranger is capable of.

_“Hello?”_

Rouge’s eyes fluttered open and she looked around. She wasn’t frozen, and she wasn’t dead, but something felt… wrong. She couldn’t quite place her finger on it, but as she sat up it came rushing back. The sound of her friends shouting, the fear as she felt herself unravel- it stood out to her.

She turned her head, noting the lack of color in the world she now inhabited. It was hard to make out details without proper shadows but she was certain there were items there, just ones that were left blank. She squinted, only managing to see flowers and a picket fence.

“Where am I?” she asked herself.

 _“Huh?”_ A voice called from around her but she couldn’t tell where it was from. “ _Rouge,”_ the voice said. _“Is that you?”_

“Syll? Where’s Shadow? And where am I?” she asked.

 _“Oh boy,”_ Sylphic said. _“This isn’t gonna be fun. I can’t hear you so well but I can feel what you’re saying, if that makes sense.”_

“That’s great,” Rouge said. “Where am I?” she repeated. 

_“How do I put this?”_ Sylphic said. _“You sorta… turned into a necklace. A necklace that I’m wearing to keep you safe.”_

“You have _got_ to be kidding!” Rouge shouted.

 _“Geez, calm down!”_ the medic’s voice called. _“Your emotional state is rubbing off on me, too.”_

“...Am I at least a pretty rock?” she asked. The bat could hear the frown in the silence that followed. “Answer the question, Syll.”

 _“It’s a rock, Rouge. It looks like a rose quartz or a pink calcite or something,”_ he responded. _“Nothing special.”_

“Nothing special?” Rouge asked, a bit offended. “Is that any way to talk to a lady?”

_“Rouge, now isn’t the time to argue. How are you even communicating with me?”_

“I woke up in this drab place where nothing has any color, and your voice came from the sky,” she said. “I still don’t know what’s happening.”

 _“Interesting,”_ Sylphic replied. He sounded lost in thought.

“You aren’t writing this embarrassment in your little notebook, are you?” she asked.

_“I wouldn’t call it an embarrassment, but I figure this could be useful information.”_

“Well it isn’t going to be useful if you don’t get me outta here!” she yelled. 

_“Relax, just go exploring,”_ Sylphic said. _“I’m pretty sure my voice is gonna go with you.”_

From beyond, Omega called Sylphic. “ _Here are the files on Jolt Briggs._ ”

Rouge lit up. “Omega, is that you? What’s going on?”

 _“Rouge, I’m afraid Omega can’t hear you.”_ He paused. _“Omega, I have good news- I can still communicate with Rouge.”_

 _“Excellent. Is she in danger?”_ he asked.

“Your concern is touching,” Rouge said, grinning. “No, I don’t think there’s anything here that could hurt me. There really isn’t anything at all.”

* * *

Sylphic sighed, playing with the crystal around his neck. “Well, hopefully you’ll see something around there soon.”

 _“Wait,”_ Rouge said. _“I think I see someone over the horizon there. Is that… Tails? And who’s that girl he has with him?”_

“Go check it out, I’ll be here.”

 _“Roger that,”_ Rouge said. Her voice faded, and so did the strange feeling around the hybrid’s neck.

 _“What is our next course of action?”_ Omega asked. 

“What did you retrieve on Jolt?” Sylphic asked. 

“ _Jolt Briggs, age eighteen as of last night. Legal name change filed seven months ago. Confirmation from GP nine months ago. Cleared for FFS, scheduled six weeks from Tuesday.”_

“FFS? But why would she need…” Sylphic looked over the photo again. “I mean, her jawline isn’t even that strong. Unless…”

He began jotting down a few more notes. “You said she had a legal name change? What was it before?”

_“The record is sealed, I do not have access to it. By all legal accounts, the person who held that name is dead.”_

Syll nodded assuredly. “I think I get it. Omega, go after Shadow. He’s gonna need your help.”

As the robot turned, the medic piped up again. “Wait!” he called.

 _“Is this the last interruption?”_ Omega asked point-blank.

“Affirmative,” Sylphic replied. He unlatched the pendant and handed it to him. “Can I trust you to keep her safe?” he asked.

 _“Affirmative,”_ Omega replied. He opened a slot in his chest and placed the stone inside. _“She is an ally, and I will not let you down.”_

Sylphic waved Omega off before turning around to do his work. He was already 73% done with Maria’s sample, but he had to run a few tests with it as well. He carefully sanitized a nearby petri dish in preparation.

He clambered off the chair and headed to the cooling unit, where he jumped up and felt around at each of the vials. “Alright, no… no… not that one either.”

His hand grazed a larger vial, and he paused as he took a look at it. “That’s weird, is this…?” He pulled out what appeared to be a blood vial and read the label. “Echidna. Where did I get this?”

Resting next to that one were two empty vials with the word “Chao”, another used echidna vial, and two hedgehog vials, one empty and one full. The medic’s stomach turned, realizing _exactly_ what it was. His hands shook both from nervous shock and from the cold of the box in front of him, and after a moment of contemplation and a little bit of swirling the deep red serum around, he put it back inside the cooler and stepped back.

His hands still shook, and his ears buzzed as his senses became filled with the sounds of muffled machinery placidly moving around a dark and empty landscape. He bit down on his lip and clutched his chest, which ached with a dull but persistent throbbing like a stab wound. _“I’m not that deceit…”_ he muttered. _“I’m not that deceit…”_

A beeping noise sounded from Bertha and his reality came back to him. He looked around and realized he’d crouched into a fetal position on the floor. “Alright, print results,” he said, quickly standing up and pressing a small green button on the machine. He slid the sample back out. “Alright, now to run those tests.”

As he prepared the slide for examination, he took a moment to look at Jolt’s photo again. “The person is dead, huh?”

Briggs came back in with a tablet. “Alright, 80,000 pages. You jammed the printer somehow, HR is going to bite me hard for it.” He stopped. “Where did everyone else go?” 

“Briggs, I need you to listen to me very carefully- Shadow and Omega are in Central City, and there’s an anomaly present there,” he said.

“Then should we enga—“

“No,” Sylphic said. ”Whatever the threat is, it turned Rouge into an object. If you go ahead with a squad, they might all be permanently trapped in this thing as well.”

Briggs pursed his lips. “I don’t have the authority to handle that- that’s up to the Commander to assess.”

Sylphic sighed. “Okay, I really don’t like how that sounds, but I’m in no position to make those commands.” He looked back to the photo. “I’m sorry.”

“What for?” Briggs asked.

“I wanted to know something about your family, and you were away, so I had Omega look up your daughter’s file.”

Briggs was quiet for a moment. “And?” he asked, crossing his arms. “That’s quite the breach of privacy. Surely you had a good reason to do that.”

“Indeed I do. But I need a few more details to get a clear picture, otherwise I won’t be certain about my hunch.”

* * *

Shadow dropped his inhibitors and frowned at the barrier in front of him. It was a solid wall of light energy that slowly breathed like a sleeping child, and upon more than an hour of trying to break through without having to go all out, the black hedgehog was fed up.

Upon the rings dropping to the dusty ground, his quills were already sparking up with an angry red flare. The wall not breaking down for him was definitely a sore point, and as he reared up to unleash an immense Chaos Blast, he felt the rage well within him.

The pulse of red shot out in all directions and shook the foundations of the giant crystalline structure in front of him. He winced, remembering how much pain this could cause when he was at full strength. An atom bomb’s worth of power wasn’t exactly easy to keep inside you at all times. And when he performed a blast, there was always a momentary ringing in the ear, though it only seemed to last a second or two for Shadow.

Shadow grinned as the barrier crackled and split, creating a path that led inside. But he could already see it reforming along the edges, so without a second thought he replaced his inhibitors and began moving forward.

“ _Wait,”_ Omega’s voice called. He was already blasting towards Shadow on his rockets. _“I’m coming with you.”_

Shadow smiled and nodded. “Then we’ve got no time to lose,” he said.

The two of them dashed through the gap and towards the crystalline ruins, where countless sets of stairs lead into dozens of carved doors.

Sonic and the rest of his crew arrived as the sides of the barrier came close to conjoining, and the hedgehog frowned. They’d seen Shadow and Omega enter by themselves and there was no way he was gonna get beat by that faker.

Nyx flew towards the barrier and tried to glide over it, only to be met with a flash and a stumble backwards through the air. “Alright, can’t go over it, can’t go around it,” she said.

Silver’s aura was already glowing. “Then I guess we go through it!” he called, using his powers to hold the barrier open a little longer. He clenched his teeth and arched his back a bit as he struggled. “I can’t hold this forever. Go!”

As the team ran through the gap, Silver strained himself to the point of feeling the early twinges of a headache arriving. He was walking slower than the rest out of concentration, but he could feel the headache coming like one would a train over train tracks.

And then, a sudden change in the pressure relieved him for a moment. He looked up, where Nyx was overclocking herself to make it easier on him. “Go!” she said, almost screaming from the stress.

As Silver let go of the barrier and barreled inside, he turned around. Focusing even more thanks to the adrenaline, he grabbed the barrier. “Alright, Nyx, your turn!” He said, adjusting his grip on the walls again.

Nyx let go and flew side to side towards Silver, and as she passed the light walls, her wings gave out and she collapsed directly on top of him. 

“Oof!” he grunted as he felt her weight force him to the ground. His concentration broke and the light wall sealed itself again. His head was spinning and he was pretty sure he overdid it.

Nyx sat up and lazily looked at Silver before realizing that he was also staring back at her. “Sorry…” she said, getting up and dusting herself off. “I didn’t mean to work myself that hard.”

“You’re fine,” Silver said, shakily getting upright. He carefully dusted himself off and stared at her with a frown. “But your nose is bleeding. You’re really not used to using those powers, are you?”

Nyx shook her head as she wiped her nose on her arm. “If I was, there wouldn’t be blood now would there?”

Silver chuckled. “You’ll get used to it, just keep practicing.”

Sonic glanced back to the other hedgehog. “Nice work, Silver! Those are some snazzy powers ya got there.” He looked at Nyx with a thumbs-up. “You too, little girl.”

Nyx huffed, but Silver patted her head. “It’s alright, he doesn’t mean it like that,” he said. He looked at Sonic. “Thanks, you said the _exact_ same thing last time.”

“I did?” Sonic asked, scratching his head. “Geez, you’ve gotta explain all this to me better. Is there another one of me?” he asked.

Nyx piped up. “Several, to be precise.”

Sonic smirked. “Well, maybe one day I’ll run into myself then.”

Nyx frowned. “Let’s hope not- bringing Silver here was already a hassle.”

Sonic shrugged. “Maybe another time. Right now we gotta get to Bastette. Considering how these things tend to go, she’s probably at the top of the middle tower.”

An explosion went off beyond a formation of spikes, and Sonic dashed over to get a good look. “Looks like the imposter didn’t wander too far.”

Shadow was fending off a monstrous crystalline brute. He was shaking with Omega under the weight of its arm, clearly at a disadvantage as he attempted to avoid getting crushed, and Knuckles quickly read the situation. “I’m comin’,” he called, sliding into the pseudo-arena towards them.

Nyx grabbed Sonic’s arms and lifted him over the spikes, and Silver flew over them effortlessly. “What are you doing here?” Sonic asked. “Weren’t you with Syll?” 

“Bastette called us on Tails’ phone when he left it behind. Rouge is messed up too.” Shadow lurched under the weight of the creature. “Turned into a crystal.”

Knuckles launched himself forward and struck the beast with his fists, causing it to pop and crackle before falling apart. “Normally you can handle beasties this big, what’s got you tired all of a sudden?”

Shadow swallowed and breathed out. “I used most of my energy trying to break through the barrier. I’m not going to be able to push myself too much for at least an hour.” He felt at his cuffs and frowned.

“That’s alright,” Sonic said. “I’d normally challenge you to a race or something, but now that you’ve said that…” He looked a little disappointed but smirked to compensate.

“Your poker face sucks,” Shadow said. 

“Hey!” Sonic yelled. 

“Guys, we don’t have time to go through this song and dance,” Silver said. “We have a tower to climb.”

* * *

“So you’re from another dimension too, huh?” Tails asked the tenrec by his side. “Do you know Silver?”

“Yeah, he and I are best friends. We save our dimension from a lot of dangerous things.” She paused. “His powers are more proactive than mine.”

“That’s alright, I don’t mind the best-friend status, you know? Leadership isn’t always the easiest thing for me to do. I like details and plans, and the way Sonic and Knuckles tend to do things is a little more... spontaneous.” Tails sighed. “I take it Silver is the same way?”

“Yeah, kinda. I mean, he’s a year younger than me, and so it’s natural for him to be curious, but… oh darn how do I put this?” She paused for a moment but continued her walk with him. “He worries way too much about us. About me.”

“Maybe he likes you,” Tails said. 

“W-what?” she asked, half-chuckling.

“Well yeah. He seems protective of his friends, and if he’s especially protective of you, that’s gotta be it, right?” Tails asked.

“Well, maybe…” she thought for a moment. “But I don’t think I’m ready for that kind of thing. There’s a lot going on where I’m from and I don’t wanna do that when danger is still around.”

“Then you gotta tell him that,” Tails said. He looked away for a moment, thinking to himself as a strange feeling overtook him. “You... have to tell him so he isn’t in the dark.”

“Are you okay? You seem troubled,” Gold said.

“Me? No, it’s fine, I have a lot on my mind. I have since I got here,” he said. “I’ve been seeing strange images flashing in my mind and I don’t know why they’re here.”

“Maybe it’s a side effect of whatever happened to us,” she said. “If you’d like, you can tell me. I promise not to judge,” she said.

Tails grimaced. “I dunno, I am afraid of someone telling everyone else.”

“Who am I gonna tell? I’m from a different dimension _and_ the future, so nobody you know would really be there.”

“What about Silver?” the fox said. “Would you tell him?”

“No,” she replied. “It isn’t his business.”

Tails went to open his mouth when he heard a shout from over the horizon.

“Tails!” a familiar voice called. “Thank goodness I found you! This place is awful!” Rouge glided through the air towards them.

“Rouge? You too?” he replied. “Are you okay?”

As the bat landed, she nodded and looked around. “Looks like this world links everyone who’s been frozen like us. Well, you two at least…”

”What do you mean by that?” Tails asked.

“ _I_ got turned into a necklace,” Rouge said, proud as though she somehow was competing for a prize. “Now I’m the prettiest thing inside here and out there.”

Gold’s head markings lit up, and a voice echoed inside Tails’ head. _“Is she always like this?”_ Gold asked him.

Tails thought back in a panic. “ _Whoa, how did you—! Okay, calm down, Tails. Just don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t—“_

 _“Don’t think about what?”_ Gold asked.

Tails turned and looked at her with a wide-eyed stare and the tenrec immediately snapped out of her daze and took a step back. “Oh.”

Tails felt tears along his eyeline and a familiar tickle in his nose. “Oh? Is that all you have to say? ‘Oh’?”

Gold responded in thought again. _“I’m trying to keep it a secret, calm down.”_

 _“How am I supposed to calm down?”_ Tails asked. _“Nobody was supposed to know and you just invaded my privacy like that!”_

 _“I didn’t want to ask about the bat aloud, okay?”_ Gold said. ” _It’s rude.”_

_“This is also very rude!”_

“Um, you two?” Rouge said. Her voice dripped with irritation. “Are you even listening to me?”

Tails snapped to attention and spat out dialogue. “Yep, uhuh, definitely! Every single syllable, every glottal stop. We should go look for Bastette.”

“Huh? Why her? Didn’t she put us in here? How do you know that’ll even work?” Rouge asked.

“From the looks of it, the Opal needs a host to use its powers. That means there’s some connection between this world and that gem, so there must be a more literal connection. If it’s anything like what the Echo Sapphire did a few months ago, then Bastette’s in here, too.” Tails tried to pull out a notebook but remembered he didn’t have one. “Shucks, now I’m gonna have to keep mental notes.”

“That shouldn’t be hard for you, though, right?” Rouge asked. 

“It would be easy, but he’s already dealing with some nasty thoughts right now,” Gold said absentmindedly.

“Oh? What kind of thoughts?” Rouge pried.

“He…” she looked at Tails, whose ears were drooping a bit from the shame. “He wouldn’t tell me. But please respect that and let him handle it.”

Tails’ eyes lightened up and his tears felt like they were going to come back, but he swallowed the feeling like a painful pill. “Alright, now where do we go?”

“Might I make a suggestion?” Gold said. The other two turned to her. She nervously played with one of her spines. “When I woke up I could hear her shouting about her family. Maybe she had a place associated with them? The last place she saw them?”

Rouge and Tails turned to each other. “Central City,” they said in unison.

“Huh?” Gold asked. “But there aren’t any cities here. How are we going to find a place that doesn’t exist?”

“It doesn’t exist except it does,” Tails said. “If this place is connected to her, then maybe thinking about it will bring it into reality around her. If that’s the case, we’ll see the skyline and we’ll be able to track her down.”

Rouge grinned. “You deserve a Peace Prize, kid. You’re clearly a smarter cookie here,” she said.

“Thanks, but I’m only working off of what I can cram into my head right now. I’d have built a full-scale plan if I had some paper to write on. I must’ve left my bag somewhere else.”

“Would it have even come with?” Gold asked. “It seems like that’s not how it would work.”

“Well, you’re wearing your robes and Rouge has her usual getup on, and I’m still wearing my clothes, so I figured that anything we were holding probably would have come along with us.”

Gold pulled up her robe sleeve and smiled as she found a familiar device strapped to her wrist. “I guess you were right. I’d heard talk of your genius from Silver but I figured it was hyperbole.”

“Wait, is that another ITCH?” Tails asked, coming closer. “Whoa, it is! The Professor must have made a few of them.” His hands eagerly began examining the device- he couldn’t help it since it was that fascinating. His inquisitive mind knew no personal space, a fault no different in magnitude to his friend’s wanderlust.

“Do you think it might work?” Rouge asked. ”I mean, there isn’t anybody else to contact in here.”

“The device can work through dimensions,” Tails explained. “Silver had one too, he uses it to contact his team back home. Which I guess means you too, Gold.” He thought for a moment. “It’s worth a shot, right?”

“Only one way to find out,” Gold said. Gently, she pressed down on the button. “Hello? Can anybody hear me?” she called.

Silence. Dead silence. Gold’s heart sank in her chest- Silver was beyond earshot. They were alone and trapped in a nightmare world with no solid means of communication. She pulled her sleeve back down and looked downwards. “Nobody can hear us.”

Or at least so she thought, because after about thirty seconds a voice crackled over the small speaker. It was a little hard to hear through a dull static that buzzed throughout the message, but the fidelity of the message was intent enough to understand. _“Gold!?”_ Silver spoke. _“Is… is that really you?”_

“Of course it’s me, you goofball!” she replied. She frowned as she heard sniffling through the communicator. “Oh geez, don’t cry.”

 _“I-I thought I lost you forever, Gold!”_ Silver whined. _“I didn’t want to believe it happened to you, but—“_

“Silver, calm down. I’m alright, I’m just… in a different world right now.” She did her best to remain resolute, but Tails caught her knees shaking a bit. 

“Silver,” the fox spoke up. “Can you hear me?”

 _“Whoa, Tails is there too? Then that must mean…”_ He paused as a crashing sound barreled through the fragile speaker. _“Gah! These creatures are a menace!”_

“Silver, we need you to relay a message to the team. Tell them we need Bastette to think about Central City,” Tails said. “Her mind is connected to this place, and we can find her if she builds the city in her mind.”

 _“Um, I guess?”_ Silver asked. _“I’m not really following but if that’s what has to happen I’ll try to pass it along.”_

From the distance, Sonic called out. _“Silver! A little help here?”_ he asked.

Tails’ heart leapt a bit at the sound of his best friend’s voice, even if he’d heard it before. He wanted to speak, but stuttered at the last second. He paused, and looked down at his hands. _Wait, why am I shaking?_ he thought.

 _“Gotta go! I’ll talk later when there’s a moment to breathe,”_ Silver said, abruptly ending the call.

Tails swallowed the bile that had risen in his throat and composed himself. “Alright, we gotta get moving.” 

“Where would we even be moving to?” Rouge asked. “There’s no real landmarks.”

Gold paused as she noticed a glint to her right. “Is that…” she pointed to where it had come from.

Another sparkle came from that direction, and Tails nodded. “I guess that’s where we go.”

As the team headed off, they didn’t notice the cloud above them that seemed to slowly tail them. Standing atop its surface, a figure tapped his foot as he hurled another shiny stone from a leather pouch in the direction he'd silently dictated. 

“Another menagerie ensnared in the spider’s web,” he said to himself. He tapped his tall boots and sighed. “I have to get them out of this place before they suffer the same fate.”

He knelt down and allowed the cloud to glide a bit faster. “I just hope my own body is safe. Never seems to be.”


	9. Rising Skyline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bastette begins to realize how dangerous the Opal is when she is granted the wish of a body she desires, but it's far too late- a vision of her dead sibling tells her as much. While her anguish summons the city within the Dreamscape, she makes plans to drown the Team that's coming up the main tower towards her. Rouge, Tails, and Gold come across a terror inside the Dreamscape that gives chase.

Bastette’s heels clicked as she slowly walked down the sterile gemlike corridors of her shiny stone castle. She felt as though she’d traveled for hours, but perhaps that was due to the exhaustion that the Opal was giving her. She could feel it in her forehead as it sapped precious energy from her, and she swore there was even a dull hum from it, though it was so far under the radar that she had trouble discerning it from her own thoughts.

She wondered what would happen if she fell asleep. Would she stay asleep? Would it cause her dreams to manifest? Her nightmares? The thought of it made her shudder- if the Opal was capable of this much with so little effort, it could probably do so much more with how much time seems to go by during REM sleep.

“Just don’t fall asleep,” she said to herself. “If I stay awake, I’ll be in control.”

She began walking towards the room where her sister lay motionless when she was stopped by a mirror. Or rather, a facet of the crystalline wall that held her reflection. She looked at herself, and for a moment, she only saw herself there as she was.

And then, she noticed something that she seemed to always notice- the shape of her brow and the strength of her jawline. She frowned, slowly taking into account how the former jutted out and the latter dropped a little too low. Her stomach swirled with discontent at the sight of it and her eyes began to water.

She looked down at herself and felt at her sides- barely noticeable curves, a barely protruding bust, legs that were just a _little_ too long compared to her torso- they were all just more things made to mock her, it seemed. She swallowed the bitter swill that had decided to make a stay in her throat, and that’s where her attention shifted next.

She held her throat- how long had her friends been secretly wanting to ask her about her voice? For all she knew, she didn’t sound anything like how she heard herself. Her eyes welled up, and as she blinked, the first set of tears ran down her cheeks, smearing what little eyeliner was left.

“Am I… a fake?” she asked herself. “Am I just lying to everyone? Should I just go back?” She looked down at her hands, at her feet, at everything on her- it felt wrong, it _was_ wrong. And the only thought that came to her mind about herself was the word _“disgusting”._

The visage in the mirror shifted a bit, revealing the figure she felt she’d wanted to see all along- a flowering young lady in a long emerald gown, a petite waist, a jaw that sloped almost perfectly. The static form of what Bastette believed was beauty itself. No angular or square anything, just smooth and gentle curves. No more having to check her clothes twice to make sure she looked acceptable, no more having to feel bad for every little flaw on her face.

No more stray hairs showing up on her chin. No more shame. 

No more hiding.

 _I want that,_ she thought. _I want that and I want it now._

A tight pain gripped her like a giant hand encompassing her body and burned through her. She toppled onto all fours and screamed. “Wait! This isn’t… what are you doing??”

First, she felt it surround her face, her jaw suddenly feeling like daggers were being pierced through her skull. She screeched as her face turned searing hot and tears rolled down her cheeks. Her brow felt like it was sinking deeper into her head at a rate fast enough that she became worried it would pierce her brain.

She groaned as she clutched her chest and began coughing. The area tightened and her breathing became shallower and shallower, and the sheer pain of it made her want to throw up, but she swallowed down anything that would’ve come up and struggled to stay relatively upright. She knew if she hit the floor, she was going to pass out from the pain.

She frantically thought to herself as she repeated the same mantra over and over again. _Don’t fall asleep, don’t fall asleep, don’t—_

Another round of pain, this time to her lower abdomen. The sting was even more intense than the one she’d felt against her chest and her body felt like it was about to fold in on itself. She cried and cried, the tears now stinging her face and leaving irritated red trails where they cascaded, and for an instant she could feel her eyes getting droopy.

 _No,_ she thought, _I can’t let you win._

Her throat tightened and she gasped for air. “What are you doing?” she squeaked. “Stop, please stop! The pain is driving me nuts, I—“

And then, all at once, the pain that held her hostage rose from her like a cloud of steam. She carefully stood up as she came down from the adrenaline high and looked at her right hand, which had bled from how hard she’d been slamming her fist into the floor. Almost immediately, it fixed itself, and the cat shook from the leftover high of the pain. 

She looked down at her legs, where a long satin gown in green had obscured them. “What is—“ she said, but stopped herself as she held a hand to her throat. Whoever had spoken, her pitch was fixed at a high tone. “Is this… my voice?”

She shakily stood up and looked at herself in the mirror. The same figure in green appeared, but this time she moved with Bastette as she twirled. The cat looked down at herself and realized it wasn’t just a vision anymore, and her tears, though still flowing, turned to joy.

“I… I can’t believe… I finally…”

She heard an echo from down the hall and went to examine its source, carefully pulling up the dress and quickly clacking down towards Briar’s resting place. “Briar, I’m coming!” she called. “Sissy’s coming, and she’s got good… news…”

As Bastette entered the spacious room- though that wasn’t saying much- she saw her sister still laying on the floor. Her joy settled back into melancholy as she reached the statue. “Briar, I’m so sorry.”

She sat down on the floor and kicked off the pair of heels that seemed to have come with the dress. She hugged her legs close to her face and sighed. 

“I didn’t mean for this to happen to you, you know. All I wanted was for you to not be sick anymore.” Her eyes drooped and she shook herself a bit as she fought the wall of sleep that came in like a slow but certain cold front. “All I wanted was for you to not have to die. Our family died in front of us, the building fell as we ran. I couldn’t even hear what they were saying before we escaped...”

Her tears began to fall again, freezing into glasslike beads and shattering on impact. 

A figure of quartz rose from the floor and stepped forward, slowly wiping the tears from her face. “What’s the matter, sis?” he said. “Don’t tell me the waterworks are running again.”

Bastette looked into the eyes of what appeared to be a moving replica of her brother and sighed. “I failed to keep Briar safe, Bolt. I really did,” she said. “But she still got sick.”

“You can’t control that,” he said to her. He smoothed back his mohawk a bit and pursed his lips. “You know, you could always ask to see mom and dad, right?”

“I can?”

“Yeah,” Bolt said. “I mean, you called me here.”

“But I didn’t wish for anything!” she said.

Bolt chuckled. There was a slight hint of nervousness to his voice. “The Opal probably can tell what you want even if you don’t ask it.”

Bastette paused. “But... they’re dead. _You’re_ dead.” She looked at him with her eyes full of quiet fear. “What are you?”

Bolt stiffened before flicking his hand, revealing her parents behind a wall. He smirked. “Now we’re all here, one big happy—“

”Liar!” Bastette yelled to him. Her eyes narrowed and she felt a shake of the tower around her as her rage boiled behind her gritted teeth. “You aren’t my brother. He’s dead. My parents are dead. You aren’t real!”

Bolt came closer and his smile went from gentle to monstrous as it curled and twisted. His head twitched as his neck bent, and he sighed. “You really don’t know what you’re dealing with, do you?” he asked.

Bastette screamed as a heavy pain came from her forehead, and the gem sunk slightly deeper towards her skull. She bit her lip to mask the pain, but it was so intense that she didn’t even realize she’d bitten right through her lip like the peel of an apple. She coughed and spluttered as trickles of blood began to stain her dress.

Bolt walked forward and knelt down in front of her, taking her ponytail and yanking it back so she could stare him in the face. “I’m afraid it’s lights out for you, my gracious host,” he said, and Bastette felt a last spark before her vision went black.

* * *

As the team entered the tower, Sonic felt the first inklings of a tremor. “Guys, what’s going on?”

“Clearly we’ve put her out by coming here,” Shadow said. “That should be obvious.”

“But she doesn’t even know where we are,” Knuckles said. “For all we know, this isn’t even the right tower.”

“Oh, no.” Bastette’s voice, cold and bittersweet, called from around them. “You’re definitely in the right place.”

The six of them huddled together back to back to better their chances of spotting the cat, but only caught a vision of her in the facets of the ceiling. There was something different about her, but each member reacted differently.

Sonic didn’t really seem to notice anything different about her aside from her new dress, though his mind jumped into concern as he spotted the blotches on the skirt and a trail of blood from the left side of her mouth. “Bastette, you’re hurt!”

“I’m alright, don’t worry about me,” she harshly spoke. “You should be the ones worrying.”

Shadow paused and took meticulous notes in his head. He’d definitely noticed a change. He couldn’t pinpoint what it was and she looked pretty much how he’d last seen her, but… well, he wasn’t aware that a change had been made. Knuckles, Omega, and Nyx all were keenly aware of what had occurred, but knew better than to run their mouths when she sounded threatening.

Silver was completely oblivious to the whole situation. His strong sense of justice prompted him to speak first, though. “We can’t let you destroy anything else!” he yelled.

“I don’t intend on spreading this any further,” Bastette replied. “At least, not when all of you are still alive.”

A gust of wind slammed them into one wall and they all toppled over onto each other. Silver’s head spun, and he as he went to stand he felt a cold drizzle down his back. His head turned up as a torrent of water came down on top of him. 

Sonic began to panic as water began flooding into the room. “Um, guys…” he tried to tromp through but even at ankle-level it made his movements unwieldy. Silver and Nyx flew up as the rest of the team began their slow panic.

A set of stairs jutted out from the opposite wall and opened to another level above. “Let’s see how many of you make it out alive. Hopefully I won’t have too many corpses to bury.”

 _“Well,”_ Omega said, seemingly unfazed by the water, _“this is not ideal.”_

Shadow began moving forward, attempting to skate, but frowned as his jets no longer allowed him to glide. He then tried his teleport, which also failed- his powers were still depleted. “No dice,” he said as the water reached their waists. “Guess we have to go through the old fashioned way.” He began tromping through the water.

Nyx noticed Sonic’s panic and hurriedly grabbed his arms. “I can fly, let’s get you out of here before—“ she was cut short as a spike went through on of her wings, tearing the edge and forcing her to gasp as she hit the water.

“Nyx!” Silver shouted, and before he could get another word out, a shard hit him directly in the neck and sank in. He dropped from his spot in the air and plunged into the water beside Sonic.

The two of them felt their feet float from the bottom and Sonic’s panic turned to full-scale poorly-hidden hysteria. “Silver, you gotta help Nyx, she’s already—“ he ducked under the water. “She’s drowning!”

“But you’re drowning!” the white hedgehog replied. “What about you?”

“Don’t worry about me, go save her now! She can’t swim if her wings are—“

He dipped under the water again. Omega’s head sank below the surface, but he was still relatively unfazed, and he moved forward.

Shadow and Knuckles pulled themselves onto the stairs and turned. Their friends were already below. The echidna cracked his neck and dove into the water.

Knuckles searched around for his friend, his eyes bleary from the water. He could still make out the blob of blue that was his friend in all that mess, but as he approached, he saw the figure double, then triple. He was frightened as more clones began to pop up.

“Oh no!” Bastette called in a teasing voice. “Which one’s the real Sonic?”

Knuckles searched the figures when one of them let go of a huge burst of air from their lungs. He immediately swam that way, and as he touched the figure, he felt Sonic’s quills go limp. This was the real one, but he was now officially drowning.

Knuckles nearly let go of his own breath as Shadow passed him and swam to Omega, who was still clunking around the bottom. As the hedgehog tugged and tugged on the robot’s arm, Knuckles began to realize how serious Shadow’s exhaustion was. He swam down with Sonic in tow and stopped next to Shadow before tapping on his shoulder.

The black hedgehog turned around and looked at him, slightly taken aback by the whiplash he gave himself. “Mph!” he hummed. 

Knuckles held Sonic out to him and pointed to Omega. Shadow shrugged in confusion, but Knuckles just pushed Sonic onto him and pointed towards the surface of the ever-filling chamber. With a firm nod, the two exchanged the limp figure and Shadow went back up.

Omega was perhaps about twenty feet under by that point, but that didn’t stop Knuckles by any means. With a swift stroke he charged towards the robot and swam behind him before pushing against his backside.

Knuckles could already feel his lungs giving out. _No!_ he thought. _Not yet!_

With a heavy push, he boosted Omega over to the stairs where he could freely climb before forcing himself up to where everyone else was perched. As he breached the surface and Shadow hoisted him onto the dry stairs, he coughed hard enough that he nearly puked.

“Ugh… how’s Sonic?” he asked as he tried to catch his breath.

“Not breathing,” Silver replied.

Knuckles’ exhaustion was overtaken by a second wind and he quickly clambered to his friend and pushed down on his chest. He must have pushed a little too hard since a fountain of water quickly spurted from his mouth, hitting both him and Shadow directly in the face.

The black hedgehog squirmed and wiped himself off, and Knuckles was too happy to care since Sonic woke up and coughed out the rest of the water. “Too close,” Sonic said. “Way… _way_ too close.”

Omega clunked onto the dry stairs. _“Let’s move forward and not repeat this task again,”_ he said. _“My servos only work for about five minutes underwater before entering safety mode.”_

Shadow smirked. “Looks like somebody’s getting you new parts soon then.”

_“G.U.N. wouldn’t think of outfitting me with that much, their budget might be absurd, but they are still frugal.”_

“I know, that wasn’t who I meant,” Shadow said. 

_“Oh, you meant the fox boy? Yes, he is someone I can work with.”_

Shadow rolled his eyes and bounded up the stairs. “Come on, we don’t have time to waste.”

* * *

The City had seemed to rise around the trio, and worse still was the fact that they wouldn’t be able to get out of it. Rouge and Tails went on their guard, and Gold was hyper aware of her surroundings out of sheer nervousness. Tails wished he’d brought something with him, perhaps his Miles Electric or something similar.

Oh right, his tails. He bopped himself upside the head and hovered over to Gold. “Hang on tight, okay?” he said.

Gold carefully took his hands and lifted off the ground, a little nervous on how far up they were going. “Rouge! Are you coming?”

The bat was still for a moment, and the two of them turned to face her. “Rouge?” Tails asked.

“Huh? Oh… right,” the bat replied, snapping out of her trance. “I’m coming.”

As they flew around they noticed a strange siren song echoing from the center. The team wasn’t entirely certain why it was there, but as soon as they heard it, Gold caught another flash off to her left. “Tails, I think the song is trying to trick us.”

Rouge listened in a bit more. “I can’t hear any real words being made out in there.” Her eyes dropped for a second and she clutched her chest. “Wait, is this…”

Tails watched as she lazily glided towards the noise. Her eyes glazed over and her other limbs were slack. “Rouge, what are you doing?” he yelled.

The bat couldn’t hear him and she didn’t respond with any motion.

Gold pursed her lips. “Here, lemme do this.” Her head markings began to glow again, and she clenched hard as she reached for Rouge.

As she plunged into her mind, Gold realized that Rouge’s thoughts were scattered. It felt like she was swimming through a sea of high-strung malcontent or a soup of equal parts fear and misplaced pride. She swallowed hard and eased her way through. _“_ _Rouge_ _!”_ she yelled. 

The sea of emotions around her settled for a moment as Rouge appeared to be listening. 

_“Rouge, I know there’s a lot on your mind right now, but you can’t listen to it! Whatever is bothering you is pulling you towards the center!”_

_“But it’s true!”_ Rouge called back. _“I don’t understand why it’s true!”_

_“What’s true?”_

_“That I just… I make things worse! Just by existing. Everybody just pretends to like me but they don’t!”_

_“And what makes you think it’s true?”_ Gold asked.

_“Because every time I try to make things better I make things worse. When I try to fix something it’s no longer about how the other person is feeling and I never see it until I’ve hurt them. And it keeps happening... over and over.”_

Gold caught a silhouette of Rouge within her headspace and swam her way over. _“Even if that were true,”_ Gold said, _“do you ever plan on fixing it?”_

 _“I…”_ Rouge stuttered, and Gold was immediately ejected from her thoughts and back into Tails’ grip. She gripped his wrists tighter.

Rouge’s body began to move normally again, and she flew back to the other two. “I don’t know what to do, Gold, I…” a tear ran along her cheek. 

Rouge had cried in the past, but she never really felt like she did this time. Her eyes were puffy and her nose tingled from it, sure- that came with the territory- but her chest was tight and her breath was short, and she could barely feel her limbs, as if she’d gone numb. She could still move them just fine, but she felt both heavy and weightless at once.

Tails hovered towards her. “Rouge, let’s go that way,” he said, gesturing with his head to his left. “We can find Bastette and you won’t have to be here too much longer.”

“R-right,” the bat said, stuttering. 

“Gold, what did you even see in there?” Tails asked. He began flying towards where he last remembered the spark.

The tenrec looked at Rouge, then to Tails. “I can’t tell you, it wouldn’t be fair to her.”

As they touched down a mile away, the trio looked around. “This is where the sparks lead us, so what are we here to do now?”

As the other two shrugged, a low and gentle weeping could be heard from inside a nearby building. They rounded the corner and caught sight of their target- Bastette sitting all alone with her back turned to the outside, cradling a white facsimile of her sleeping sister within a cavern-like outcropping of a crumbled skyscraper.

“I’m so sorry, Briar,” she softly spoke. “I didn’t want them to disappear like that.”

A white hand came up and touched her face. “Not your fault,” Briar’s voice echoed.

“But it is! I tried to get them out, but dad was insisting we’d be fine.”

A voice echoed in the cat’s head for a moment. _“He was wrong, but that’s not your fault either.”_

Bastette slumped over. “Who are you, and why are you in here?” she bellowed.

“My name is Gold, miss,” the tenrec said. “You must be Bastette, it’s a pleasure to…” she trailed off as Bastette rose off the ground.

Or more accurately, her body took on a more grotesque form. Her body hung limp from her head, which stood suspended in a greenish but translucent bubble. This bulbous liquid helmet was propped up by eight spindly legs, which maneuvered like an arachnid in a stalking mode.

Tails and Rouge came behind Gold, and the former spoke up first. “What _is_ that thing?” he said.

“Whatever it is, it can’t be Bastette,” Rouge said. “Not anymore.”

“Very estute observation, Rouge,” the creature said. It stood a little bit more upright, and Bastette’s body hung over them, her feet not even touching their heads from how high up she was. “Though smarts aren’t gonna save you now.”

As it reared up, Tails could see that the creature’s legs were barbed and big enough to cut to the bone with ease. He carefully backed up. “Gold, Rouge? Any backup plans?”

“I can’t get through to her,” Gold replied, grabbing the fox’s arms again.

Rouge jumped towards the spider and slammed her foot into its head. “Alright you two,” she said as she landed. “I’ll take care of—“

She was abruptly cut short as one of the legs ripped through her catsuit and grazed her leg. She bit her lip and hissed in pain before swallowing her fear. “Okay, plan B, you two go on ahead and I’ll trail behind.”

As the trio began their dash and the creature pursued, Rouge went into overdrive trying to kick every possible obstacle into the path of the spider, but since it was an arachnid it managed each barrier with relative ease.

Tails knew he had to think of something, and fast. If they didn’t… well, he wasn’t entirely sure of what this thing would do to them, but considering that it was spider trying to kill them, he figured it wouldn’t be good. He felt an itch at one of his ankles, but as he rubbed it with his other foot, his eyes widened and he thought of a plan.

“Rouge!” Tails said. “Catch!” 

“Wha—?” Gold yelped as she was tossed into the air and caught by Rouge. “Tails, why did you do that?”

The fox landed on the ground. “New strategy.” He made a hop and clicked his heels together, hearing a familiar buzz as a pressure encased his ankles. “Straightwinds, let’s do this!”

As mechanisms locked over his shoes, the wheels of a pair of skates lifted him off the ground. “And that’s why you always have a backup plan,” he muttered.

One of the legs came down a mere three inches from his neck and he frowned. “Alright, you wanna play? Then let’s play some tag,” he said, tapping on the leg before bolting off. “You’re it!”

The spider, enraged, began spindling its way toward the fox as he turned the corner, and the other two were left chasing the spider from a respectable distance.

“Geez, if only I had a speedometer or something to help me figure out how fast these things are going,” Tails said aloud, thrusting his arms forward as he took long strides. Everything around him looked like one long endless smear of paint as the city’s color bled through. “Is this what Sonic normally sees? How does he keep up?”

He looked behind him and saw that the spider was gaining on him. He balanced on one of his skates and tapped the heel with the other, forcing both of them to boost a bit. Tails skidded along the road as he put the brakes on before accelerating around the next corner.

“I will admit that this is pretty fun,” he said. “Maybe once we get back I can test this out with some competition.”

He paused for a moment, remembering the feeling from earlier, but shoved it down as he saw pillars rising in his way up ahead of him. “Oh boy… I hate cheating…”

He began his artful dodge around the pillars, a dance that only lasted a few seconds but for Tails seemed to be at least a full minute and a half. As each column passed within inches of his face or his feet, he felt the wind puff a bit more pride into his face, and his fear began to fade into a genuine playfulness.

Now Tails understood that attitude he’d found endearing in his friends.

What he didn’t understand was the pillar that struck him from the side. It had jutted from the wall beside him and crashed into him at full force, flinging him into an alleyway and slamming him into a brick wall. He tumbled over as his skates crackled apart, but shakily stood back up as the spider strode into the alleyway entrance, closing him off. 

Tails jumped up to fly, but screeched as the spider hit the edge of his tail with one of its legs. “What’s the matter, Tails?” Bastette’s voice called. “Cat got your tongue?”

Tails was in too much pain to acknowledge the terrible pun as he shakily stood. “Bastette, please. We’re your friends! Doesn’t that matter to you?”

The spider paused, clearly trying to parse out the sentence. It shook violently. “Please, Luneria, don’t hurt him, he’s just a child!” Bastette shouted, her own voice contrasting over the previous one.

It was abruptly cut out by a cold and twisted grin from the cat. “I don’t care,” the heartless voice said as it returned. “It feels too good.”

As another limb lunged for the fox, he heard a metallic clang against something in front of him. He looked up and swallowed as Rouge was holding the limb in a locked high-kick.

“Tails…” she grunted. “Take Gold and get out of here. I told you I’d handle it!” Her foot shook and she gritted her teeth in concentration. “Go! Don’t bother with me!” 

“Rouge, you’re trapped here too! We can’t just leave you!” Gold said.

Another leg shot forward aiming to run Rouge through, but she managed enough of a dodge that the barbed ends only sliced through more of her catsuit and a bit of the skin underneath. She wailed, but still firmly held her foot in a lock as the leg slammed into the concrete behind her, just barely missing the younger two. 

Tails stood firm as Gold clung to him and shook. “I’m not gonna leave you behind! You might be rough around the edges but you’re still a friend!” he said. “Friends don’t leave friends behind!”

“Tails,“ Rouge said, tears streaming down her face. “You’re probably the kindest and most optimistic _idiot_ I’ve ever met.”

As a third leg shot toward the bat, a spark struck it and caused its trajectory to shift and hit the concrete wall to the bat’s right. She looked up, where a figure of light blue had jumped down towards them. “What on Earth?”

The figure, a blue parakeet with a white crest along his neck and shoulders, came to perch atop the leg Rouge was holding up. He seemed almost weightless, but Rouge knew that couldn’t be right. “Hello gorgeous,” he said to the spider. “Glad to see you’re doing well for yourself. You shouldn’t be messing with them though.”

“Ugh, you. What would you know about it, interloper?” Luneria hissed. She pulled one of her limbs out and flung it at the bird, who simply leaned left and let it pass right by him. “Why, you little!” She pulled the second from where Tails and Gold were standing and tried again, only to find it suspended midair.

The bird pushed it aside with his index finger and smirked. “Interloper? Last time I checked, you weren’t supposed to be here. And who’s that poor girl you’ve got there?” he asked. “If she’s your means in here, then I’m afraid I’m going to have to void your ticket.”

“Shut up you obnoxious little pest!” Luneria said. “She’s just a pawn for when I make my grand entrance.” She pulled away the leg Rouge had been holding up, causing the bat to tumble and the bird to leap to the ground. 

“Get behind me, all of you!” the parakeet said as he gracefully landed. His palm supported some of his weight and his legs were bent in a kneel that didn’t quite let his knees touch the ground. He watched the spider gear up for another lunge, but as Luneria swung four limbs towards him he showed no fear in his face and simply put a hand up. 

A familiar flash shot out from his open palm, and before him, everything seemed to move in slow motion. He smirked as he backed up towards the trio.

Rouge, still behind him and thoroughly beat up, gazed at the spectacle with her mouth slightly ajar. “No, it can’t be,” she thought aloud.

The bird gestured to them. “Alright, everybody hang on. I’m still rusty with four of us, but it should work.” As soon as they were all securely holding onto him he grinned. “Sorry if the ride’s a bit turbulent.”

He breathed in as the legs closed in on them and then slowly breathed out, focusing on the only location within this space that he could remember. And as the leg came within an inch of his forehead, he took a sharp breath and whispered. “Chaos… Control.”

As the limbs came crashing through the wall behind them, the four of them blinked out of existence.


	10. Hidden Gem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Within the Dreamscape Rouge, Tails, and Gold come face to face with the parakeet, Akshi, who rescued them from the clutches of Luneria and learn the rules of how the place works. As that happens, Sylphic gets a vision revealing Gerald's secret to treating the symptoms of NIDS and formulates a plan to himself as to how to get that information to a clearly out of control friend.

Rouge coughed hard as she collapsed onto the brick pavement of a sunny jungle getaway. As her eyes fixated to the sunlight, she wondered if she and her friends had escaped that awful dimension. After all, the place they were in now looked strangely familiar, though there were plenty of stark differences to make her question that. There was very little grass growing between the grey bricks beneath her, and the structures she could see from her low vantage point looked as thought they’d been built within the space of the past year.

But as she stood up she was met with the not-so-amused face of the parakeet that had rescued them. He was tall and he bent over with his hands on his waist, and the band of black that stretched across the bridge of his beak and framed his leaf-green eyes couldn’t hide the sheer anger that had overcome him. The feathers that normally fell around his cheeks were puffed up in irritation.

“You’ve got to be kidding me, right?” he said. “You’re out there risking your life when you could very easily… Ugh!” the parakeet said. “Are you an idiot? No, _don’t_ answer that- it’s obviously rhetorical.”

“Pardon? Who are you calling an idiot here? I thought I was doing a noble thing!” Rouge said. 

“You did a _stupid_ thing is what you did. You could have shattered yourself like that!” he said, gesturing at her with both his hands flat and parallel to one another. “Do you have no sense of self-preservation?”

“Um, what?” she asked.

“Great! Now I have to explain this to you when I’m angry _and_ hungry.” He turned to the three of them. “You know what? No. Eat first, then I’ll explain.” He walked towards a domed structure nearby and tapped the nearby tree with his elbow. “It’s Enigma Fruit, practically extinct in your world. Don’t worry, it might be ancient but it’s fresh. Oh, and it tastes good, no matter what- it _always_ does.” His tone was already calming down and his feathers were slowly relaxing, but there was still a glint of concern to him.

Tails frowned, walking over and picking up the brown fruit that had fallen to the ground. “I’m sorry, but…” he paused, trying to find the appropriate words. “How can you use Chaos Control? I’ve never seen a user that proficient since—“

The bird frowned and hurriedly held a finger up over his mouth. “Shh, Tails, it isn’t polite to draw comparisons to people, especially in the company of one of their friends,” he sternly replied. He glanced at Rouge for a moment.

“Wait, how do you know my nickname?” Tails asked, a bit freaked out.

“Too many questions right now,” the bird said. “You’re gonna make my head spin.”

Gold played with her spines again. “Can you at least tell us your name?” she quietly asked.

“My… name?” the parakeet asked, scratching at his beak. “Well, that’s a tricky thing, you see- I don’t really remember what my name is, so I pick something that I think is cool every time I meet travelers. Though usually the company isn’t so… frozen.”

“Akshi!” a young voice called.

“Aw geez, look who’s been woken up from her nap,” the bird replied. “Thanks, bat girl.”

Rouge didn’t say anything as she huffed.

A smile broke over Tails’ face as he saw Briar running down the stairs. “Akshi?” he asked. “Did you come up with that or…?”

“No no, that’s what this little tyke decided to call me when I rescued her. I told her to call me ‘Oxygen’ but she said it was too boring and called me Akshi instead.” He carefully hoisted the small cat onto his hip. “Honestly, I might keep it. It’s a fitting gift.”

“Oxygen?” Rouge said. “Sounds corny.”

“I call myself Oxygen because I take your breath away,” Akshi said, giving the bat a wink. He laughed as the bat squirmed a bit. “I’m just teasing, you know. I know how big of a fan you are, Rouge.”

“I don’t even know you!” she scoffed. “You can’t just assert yourself as someone’s love interest, you know!”

“Love interest?” Akshi replied. “Who said anything about love?”

Rouge’s face became even redder. “So you admit that I’m not your biggest fan, then?”

“You still are,” Akshi poked, “but it’s infatuation, not love. I’m just another in a long list of hearts for you to steal.”

Rouge turned away and crossed her arms. “I’m not eating any of your dumb fruit.” Her stomach begged to differ however, growling in discontent. She dutifully but begrudgingly obeyed her appetite and sat down next to Tails, who was already taking a bite of the insides.

“Whoa, this tastes like peppermint candy! That shouldn’t happen though,” Tails observed.

Akshi grinned. “Enigma fruit tastes like whatever food you enjoy. It usually ranges from what you simply like to a guilty pleasure or a comfort food.”

Gold joined them and took another fruit before carefully peeling the shell. “Akshi, can you tell us what you meant? I know it’s only been a few minutes, but it sounded useful.”

The parakeet sighed. “Alright, I’ll explain since I’ve managed to get the lid back on my emotions. But first…” He whispered something into Briar’s ear and set her down. “Do you think you can do that for me?” he asked.

Briar nodded. “I’ll bring back lots of them for you.”

“Good,” Akshi said. “Now run along.”

As Briar left, Tails spoke up. “Is she going to be safe?” he asked. “What if the spider finds her?”

“This place is closed off. Nothing can get in or out unless I command it,” Akshi said. “It’s my headspace, my memory palace.”

“How does that work?” Rouge asked between bites.

Akshi rubbed his hands together and sat down. “Well, let me start out by clearing a misconception- this plane of existence isn’t an illusion created by the Opal or any of Luneria’s Eyes for that matter. It’s simply a collective realm shared by everyone, consisting of billions of pockets where people can freely conceptualize or dream. Each person has sort of an “island” in the ocean of the collective mind.”

“I think I’m getting it so far,” Tails said. “How about you two?”

The other two were nodding, but Tails wasn’t convinced.

“Oh come on, this isn’t _that_ hard to understand,” the fox said.

“It’s alright, I don’t exactly explain this to most people because unless they have more mystical circumstances to do so, they won’t be able to reach anyone else’s island.” 

“Wait,” Tails said. “How are you able to move from your ’island’ to Bastette’s then?”

“Well, when Luneria’s Eye turned you to stone, you were given permission to enter Bastette’s space since she’s the current host. I happen to have the same unlucky privilege of being caught in the spider’s web, meaning I also have permission anytime a host is chosen.” 

“Are you looking to break out, too?” Gold asked, biting into her fruit. “Mmm…” she hummed, clearly enjoying the meal.

Akshi chuckled and clutched his head. “Oh, that’s a good one…” He settled down. “No, I’m afraid it’s far too late for me, and that’s exactly why I was upset at your friend for getting badly damaged.”

“Hey, how could I have known?” Rouge said, gingerly touching her wounds. “This is all new info for me!”

Akshi nodded. “I apologize for yelling at you earlier, it’s just… you have an undying spunk that I’ve always found rather charming. I’d hate to see you suffer the same fate I did.”

“And what fate is that?” Tails asked.

”When Luneria uses the Eye to freeze over her victims, there are multiple ways she can go about “killing” those she traps. She can torture them to death here, where the force of the anguish is enough to shatter the physical body, or she can manually shatter the physical body herself. And if that happens, your form here becomes unstable and falls apart.”

“But then how are you speaking to us?” Rouge asked. “If you were shattered like you imply, wouldn’t you be dust right now?”

“That would be the case, but that’s the other thing about your form here- in close proximity, the pieces of your body demand to be pulled back together to make you whole again. Unfortunately, your physical self doesn’t reform exactly the same the second time, and because of that, your body becomes inert to transformation and… well, you’re trapped here forever.”

Tails nodded. “So you were trying to keep her from shattering, then?” he asked.

Akshi nodded back. “If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s watching suffering like this. I saw my friends die one by one when I was broken. It’s why I rescued Briar to begin with- had Luneria found her first, she would have been used as ransom at the very least and guilt-bait at worst.”

“How are we supposed to get out of here?” Tails asked. “The Opal can’t be destroyed from the outside, and it seems like it’s impossible to reason with her from in here.”

Akshi paused. “Maybe it’s just me, but something tells me there’s another avenue to explore. But I can’t really put my finger on it.”

“Wait, you still haven’t told us how you know us!” Rouge said. “How can you know so much without us seeing you?”

“In time, bat girl, in time,” Akshi said, rising from the ground. He threw the rind of the fruit over his shoulder and as it hit the ground it vanished in a puff of smoke. “Maybe tonight I’ll pull you aside and tell you the truth.”

“But wait! How long is the day going to last? Our friends are fighting out there and we‘re stuck in here,” the fox said. ”They’ll be—“

“Tails,” the bird said, not even looking behind. “What do you know about dreaming?”

“That it usually feels like hours but REM sleep maybe only lasts about five… oh. Oh, I get it now!” he said, resolutely placing his fist on his open palm. 

“Exactly. Time doesn’t work the same in here as it does out there,” Akshi said. “See you tonight. Oh and Rouge?” 

“What?” 

“Come with me.”

* * *

Sylphic was still searching through pages upon pages of notes and nervously racking his brain for a solution. He’d done the tests and it seemed like everything was treatment resistant due to incompatibility. He wasn’t sure where to go.

He slowed down on the device and took it page by page as he recognized that frantic skimming would do him no good. He wasn’t entirely sure why slowing down would make the process paradoxically take less time, but he tried not to let that clear contradiction get in the way of his self-soothing. 

As he skimmed through the pages a bit more carefully on the tablet, this time a bit slower, his gaze caught a glimpse of a picture that had been xeroxed into the file. “Wait, what is this?”

In the pristine handwriting of a young girl were the biggest two words: “Thank You.”

He swallowed and ran his finger along the image. “Maria?” he muttered. “How did you get this into here?”

“ _And I’ll make one for you too, just you wait!”_ a voice echoed from behind him. 

He turned and searched around the room. “Maria, is that you?”

From within his knapsack, a light glimmered. Sylphic’s stomach swirled, and he was unsure of what to do.

 _“Is there anybody who will be brave for me?”_ the stone echoed.

Like muscle memory, the hybrid responded. “Well, Shadow’s being really brave for you right… now…” he trailed off. “Wait a second.”

He looked to his notes, to the samples he’d gotten recordings for. He pulled up the DNA scan results and double checked them, and that’s when it hit him. He _had_ remembered, but only in a daze. Only when he’d fought with Shadow and been beaten so bad he’d been semi-conscious.

His thoughts flashed back to that first fight with Shadow. When he’d been exhausted, he’d only thought he was remembering fuzzy details, but as he looked down on the page, the exact words came to him.

_Maria Robotnik, born on the space colony ARK. Blood Type O._

He placed his finger on that section of the results and stared at it for a moment, where the text read “Blood Type: O-.”

Without a warning, the stone went off, and Sylphic tumbled to the ground. While he wanted to swear under his breath for such a clumsy fall, he stopped mid-sentence at the sight of a pair of small blue shoes. Now was clearly not the time to swear, even if the vision of Gerald’s granddaughter had no way to hear him.

Maria was wearing a paper crown on her head and a lab coat was tied into a cape, and she held a ruler towards a pair of figures- a mustached scientist and a small black hedgehog, both of which were exchanging glances and clearly wondering what was going on. Behind her was a saddlebag with a bunch of miscellaneous items she’d crafted out of paper along with a few cans and a small assortment of sugar-paper clippings.

Maria came over to her grandfather, a third person view for the hybrid now, and held the ruler up. “Okay grandpa, you have to kneel now.”

“Like this?” Gerald asked, clearly playful and knowing already how such a ceremony went. “I hope I’m not being too bold, Your Highness…”

“Not at all!” Maria said. “Now be still.” She took the ruler and tapped both of his shoulders. “I knight thee Sir Grandpa, protector of the ARK and its inhabitants, and ruler of all sciences. Let us celebrate his exaltation to Knighthood!”

There was a pause, and Maria frowned. “Shadow, that’s your cue to clap,” she said.

“O-oh,” the hedgehog said, gently clapping with an awkward frown on his face. “I… forgive me, Ma— I mean, Your Highness…”

Maria giggled sweetly and hung a paper-chain necklace around Gerald’s neck. “You may now stand with honor, Sir Grandpa.”

She carefully looked at Shadow. “Alright, it’s your turn.”

He blushed. “D-do I…?”

The girl nodded. “Don’t be afraid, it’s just a ruler. It isn’t a real sword, so it won’t hurt you.”

“I know,” Shadow said, still embarrassed a bit as he knelt down. He tried his best to do the same thing the Professor did, but his kneel was a bit more wobbly- clearly this was an unorthodox bodily position.

Maria cleared her throat. “In honor of your achievements, your protection of the Heir to the throne, Princess Maria, and your ever-giving and brave spirit,” she said, tapping his shoulders, “I knight thee Sir Shadow, the Brave and Bloodied.”

“Wouldn’t that mean I’ve fought something? I don’t think I could ever—“

“Shh,” Maria said, placing a necklace over him as well. He caressed the sugar paper with the edge of his fingers.

“Let us all celebrate his exhaltation to Knighthood!” Maria said, clapping along with her grandfather. “Oh, and I almost forgot!”

She turned around and dug in her little hobbies bag. “I brought you two something from the stockpile. Sorry grandpa, you know I love this drink.”

“Maria…” Sylphic said from the corner of the room. “You know how disappointed he was, right?”

She held out a strawberry lemonade to Shadow, whose eyes widened as he saw it. “It’s you fifth monthaversary!” Maria said.

Shadow’s face was turning red as he took it and began fumbling with the tab on the can. “Y-you remembered?”

“Of course I did, silly!” she replied. “I wanted to make this month special, so made sure you becoming my knight and you being born to help make me better were the same day. That way the memory will last forever.” She swiveled and pulled out two cards, one for each of them. “Here you go,” she said. “I made one for each of you. It’s like a certificate.”

As Shadow sipped his lemonade, he looked over the card before turning to Gerald. “Did you explain it to her?” he asked.

“Of course I did,” Gerald replied. “She’s an intelligent girl and she ought to know.”

“Yeah, he told me that since we have the same blood type, that means you’re a universal donor. So that means that you can donate blood to me or anybody else without complications.”

Sylphic snapped back into reality and looked down at the stone, whose glow had faded. He should have been crying by now, having seen the source of his eternal sorrow, but instead a smile had broken across his face. He looked to the page again. “Maria, you’ve just saved a life…” he whispered in awe.

Carefully he got down from the stool and began taking back his belongings.

As he finished packing his bag, he grabbed his notebook and the picture of Briggs’ family fell to the ground. He paused for a moment and looked back into his bag. “And I think I know how to get through to Bastette, too.”

He took a blue pen to the picture and nodded resolutely before wrapping it around the Sapphire. Then he unscrewed the cap to his canteen. “I’m surprised they didn’t confiscate this, I could have been smuggling nitroglycerin in here for all they knew,” he muttered to himself.

Breathing slowly, he drew the water out and pooled it around his feet before pushing off, creating a wave he rode down the corridors. He had to find someone and leave, but the hallways were surprisingly empty. Perhaps they were switching shifts?

As the hybrid passed a pane of glass, his peripherals detected a strange break from his regular hue. He slowed to a stop, still hovering on his wave, and looked into his reflection. The glass made it hard to see since it wasn’t particularly reflective, but nonetheless he tried.

As he ran his fingers through his quills, something snagged on his glove and he momentarily hissed at the pinch of it. He drew his hand out to remove it, and as he did, he noticed that it was a different color from the rest of his quills. While his own quills were a greyish lavender, this one was blue along its tip.

He sucked his finger a bit to relieve what he figured would be a slight wound and examined it a bit more. “Am I starting to take on more of their design?” he asked. “That can’t be right.”

He brushed through his quills again, and he found another blue one. This time he didn’t pull it out. “Hmm.” Carefully, he pulled the stone out and wrote something on the back of the picture before tucking the dislodged quill into his notebook.

“Excuse me,” a voice said. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Sylphic looked down the hall, where a guard had come around the corner. He gently surged over and stopped in front of him. “Yes, Briggs left me to my own devices to work, but I’m done, so I need an escort. These hallways are labyrinthine.”

“No kidding, you could get lost in here,” the guard said. He straightened up, suddenly aware of his break in professionalism. “R-right this way.” 

“I don’t suppose you could have Briggs come to the hangar, could you? I have one last favor to ask.”

The guard paused. “And what exactly do you think we can do?”

“I need a fast ride to Central City and I trust him the most out of you lot,” the medic plainly said. The guard was clearly concerned about the choice in words but ultimately forgot about the tone as he reached down to his radio.

The guard sighed. “Captain Briggs, this is James South, I’ve got a purple thing here who needs you to come to Hangar B, over.”

Sylphic rolled his eyes.

“Rodger that, thank you for the heads up. And his name is Sylphic,” Briggs said. “You ought to not call him a ‘thing’, over.”

“Understood.”

* * *

“How long have we been walking on these stairs?” Sonic groaned. “I’m so bored!”

“Relax,” Silver said, looking at his watch. “It’s been… oh, wow. _Ten minutes?_ I mean, I expected the tower to be a climb but that’s a long way without a landing.” He held Nyx, still asleep, in his arms.

“They _are_ spiral stairs attached to the outer wall, and they’re made of crystal,” Shadow said. “Probably doesn’t need too much structural support.”

 _“I’m going to have to get another maintenance check when this ordeal is over,”_ Omega said. His voice was even drier than before.

“Oh, don’t whine, Omega,” Shadow said.

 _“I recall you looking at the staircase and groaning, do not throw stones,”_ Omega replied.

“You’re lucky I find your sense of humor endearing,” Shadow said.

_“You’re welcome.”_

“Wait, why am I slowing down for all of you?” Sonic asked. “I can get up the stairs a lot faster.”

“How about because they can’t go as fast as you,” Shadow said.

“You mean _you_ can’t go as fast as me,” the blue hedgehog replied. “Admit it.”

“Nope, I’m not slow, I’m just…” he paused for a breath. “Just exhausted. Thanks for reminding me.”

Sonic crossed his arms. “Excuses, excuses.”

“Try blasting your way through a wall and then get back to me.”

“Hmph!” Sonic sped up the stairs to the hole in the top of the ceiling, only for his shoulders to roll back and his arms to go slack. “Are you serious?” he yelled, and then he promptly disappeared onto the floor above.

As the others reached the exit, they saw what had Sonic upset- another set of stairs only two stories this time. Sonic was already at the top, of course, but there was no exit and the stairs just came to a stop at the ceiling. The blue blur was pushing against the ceiling, trying to brute force it.

Knuckles stepped onto the stairs, and in an instant they began moving like an escalator, the lowest stair disappearing as the one above it shifted downwards.

Sonic turned around as his perch shifted closer to the ground. “Hey, what are—“

As Knuckles came back to the floor, the stairs stopped moving. He had a puzzled look on his face. “I don’t understand…”

“What was that?” Sonic asked, turning around. The ceiling hatch slid open behind him.

“Sonic, look!” Silver said. “It’s open now!”

Sonic turned back, and the hatch closed. “Ah okay, I can play your little game,” he said with a smirk. “I think I get how it works!” he called.

“Yeah, I think so too,” Shadow said. “We can’t go up together, so we go up one at a time, and we can’t open the door while facing it, so we go up backwards. If multiple people are on the staircase, it’ll start moving and send us back down.”

“Alright, so we go one at a time,” Silver said. 

Sonic turned around. “Alright, I’m almost up so… here goes.”

Sonic turned backwards and zipped up the remaining steps until he reached the landing. Shadow groaned, unamused by how Sonic was showing off how he ran just as fast going backwards as he did forwards. “Better hurry up, this place looks weird!” the blue blur shouted.

Knuckles paused. “Is Nyx awake yet?” he asked.

Silver poked at Nyx’s shoulder. “Hey, Nyx? We need your help.”

“Ugh, whuh?” Nyx drowsily responded. “Are we at the top of the stairs yet?”

“Well… sorta,” Silver said. “We need you to be awake for this next part.

Nyx rubbed her eyes and clambered off of Silver. “Okay, what do you need me to do?” she asked. She saw the new staircase and frowned. “You’re having me climb more stairs?” she asked. Her aura turned red.

“Relax, these are different,” he said. “Omega, can you demonstrate?”

The robot was silent.

“Omega, please demonstrate,” Shadow asked.

 _“I heard him the first time, Shadow. I was merely determining ally status… before making a decision.”_ He turned around and began walking up the stairs backwards. 

Knuckles sighed. “He really is a bolt-brain isn’t he?”

“A majority of his attention goes to his insatiable bloodlust,” Shadow said. “Well, whatever the robot equivalent is. Either way, this sort of methodical movement isn’t really his style. Now if you ask him to bust down a wall, he’ll ask you when and where.”

Silver took off his device and flicked his wrist. The aura around it flowed for a few seconds before the ITCH plummeted back into his hand. “I still can’t levitate things well- my powers are damaged by whatever hit me in the neck,” he said, relatching the device.

Shadow nodded. “I can feel my strength returning, but I’m still too under the limit to be using any of it on teleporting. It looks like both of us are going to be walking as well.” He looked down, noticing the tear in Nyx’s wing, and his stomach churned a bit. He wanted to comfort this little girl, but he wasn’t exactly sure how to go about it when there was little to be done about her wing.

“It’s okay, I get it,” Nyx said, catching Shadow staring at her. “It’ll heal. I’ve had much _much_ worse.” She looked away for a moment. “It’s fine.”

Knuckles nodded. “Alright, he’s up the stairs. My turn.”

As he took his turn, Shadow looked at Nyx. “Are you alright?”

“Me?” Nyx said. “Yes, I’m fine.”

“Really? Are you certain?”

Nyx swallowed a lump in her throat. “I-it’s about…”

She was cut short as jerked forward and fell to her knees. Her head was down turned and her hair seemed more ruffled than before. “No, not now, not...” she whimpered. Her aura flickered a dull gold like a child playing with a light switch.

“Nyx!” Silver said, propping her upright. “Nyx, it’s okay, it’s gonna be—“ he stopped as he saw the faintest glimmer of something below her bangs- a gold glowing symbol of an eye. “What the…”

It disappeared as soon as the words exited his mouth, and Nyx wrestled her way out of his arms without a word. 

“Nyx?” Silver asked. He was only given silence and a cold shoulder as she looked up the stairs. “Nyx?” he repeated, a bit softer.

She turned around and stared at him, tears running from her eyes. Still no words, just a stiff standing figure trying not to shout from the embarrassment.

Silver’s speech became loose and defeated. “Nyx…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank GaySarahK for listening to my insane ramblings. Maybe it's because of recent events with my life, but she always pushed me forward. On those days where I genuinely felt like my writing was just the *absolute worst* and I didn't wanna feel the pain of the many insults that had been tossed at me by the one who was supposed to love me, her presence and willingness to listen pushed me to go beyond my limits and write this work. Hours of Discord calls in and I'm now more than 77k words into this AU (not including this chapter). I never would have continued this if I didn't have someone willing to listen.
> 
> A link to her work is here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25695922/chapters/62389465 . 
> 
> Please go check it out, she deserves so many kudos. The emotional intimacy of each moment with the narrator will make you more and more excited to see where it progresses. I intend to immortalize some details of her fic here, starting with the drink of choice. 
> 
> So I raise a glass to GaySarahK for her patience and kindness, and to you, my readers, for making it this far. Happy Monthaversary, all!


	11. Making Joy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Akshi treats Rouge's wounds, he tells her about what he'd meant before, and what he knows about her, leading to the revelation of who he is and where he's seen her- or rather, heard. Tails uses deductive reasoning to solve the same problem, prompting a very deep and personal discussion of the content of what Gold had glimpsed before that ends with some shocking results.

“What did you call me over here for?” Rouge asked. The wounds on her thighs were aching and left her with a limp as she following him.

Akshi narrowed his eyes. “You need to take your tone from an eight to a three- you’re _way_ too loud.” 

“ _I’m_ too loud? Are you serious with that petty attitude?” she asked.

“Pot, meet kettle,” the bird replied.

“Ugh,” Rouge said, crossing her arms as she followed him to an open-air dome set atop a circle of pillars. “What am I doing over here?” she asked, a bit quieter this time.

“Well, first we need to get you cleaned up,” he curtly replied. As they reached the top of a set of stairs leading to the structure, he gestured to a bench. “Here,” he said.

The bat looked about her surroundings. Ivy crawled up the white marble pillars and into the gilded sky of the dome above. The air smelt of sweet roses after a summer rain, even though the sunny day was reaching the late afternoon without a cloud in sight. From the center of the structure, a pool of steaming clear water sat eagerly beckoning any who drew near. A red maple leaf fell on the pool and rippled the water for a moment before settling into a graceful float.

Rouge quietly sat down. “I still don’t understand what you meant. I mean, I understand the shattering part, but… how did you even know I existed, much less know me by name? Have you been spying on me?”

“Eh, it’s not spying if you were there first,” Akshi said, kneeling in front of her. “Your thigh’s bleeding pretty bad. Here.”

Carefully he placed his hands over her leg and gently pressed down. In response, she hissed in pain and gave him an angry smack to his face. “Yowch, don’t you know how to treat a lady?”

“I suppose it’s been a while since I’ve had the fortune of a meaningful conversation with one,” he said, rubbing his cheek. “I guess in your case, the _mis_ fortune.”

Rouge scoffed. “Why are you harassing me?”

“For all intents and purposes, when I saw you taking on that spider by yourself, I saw what you were- a rose quartz. It’s a very telling stone.” He put his hands back on her thigh, a little more lightly this time. “Your self-esteem is low hanging fruit, in short.”

“Huh?” Rouge asked. “Wait, low hanging fruit? Excuse me?”

“A rose quartz was what you were turned into, right? You can tell a lot about the frozen by their gem type.” He breathed in. “Chaos… Control.”

A spark shot from his hand, and for a moment, Rouge felt a painful zap against her leg. She kicked Akshi in the face and then immediately frowned and leaned forward to reach out. “Are you… I didn’t mean to…”

Akshi burst out laughing. “You know, I’ve heard you fighting out there and I always wanted to know how strong you were,” he said, wiping the blood from his beak. “Guess the rumors were true.”

“W-what rumors?” she asked. “Who’s been telling you rumors?”

“Well, I heard through the grapevine that you’re quite… leggy.” He smiled. “Seriously, you hit me pretty hard there.”

“I’m… sorry…” Rouge said. Her ears folded down a little. Normally she was never sorry about a kick, but the guilt at kicking someone who was only trying to help seemed more intense now than ever.

“Don’t be, it was fun,” he said. “Though I don’t think your enemies see it that way.” He leaned forward and checked the other wound, but noticed it was merely a scrape. “Looks like that one will heal up on its own, thank goodness.”

Rouge looked at the skin beneath the ripped spot on her clothes where she’d been treated. It had become as clean as before she’d been injured. “Didn’t know Chaos Control could do that,” she said.

Akshi sighed. “Well unfortunately it looks like my Chaos Control couldn’t rework the fibers of your suit. I’m afraid I’ll have to mend it manually.”

Rouge blushed and scowled at him. “E-excuse me?” she said. “What are you, some kinda creep?”

“Hardly.” Akshi grinned. “I never said you had to be present. But I brought you up here so you could relax.” He pointed to the pool. “I figured that you were probably sore from holding your leg up for three minutes straight.”

“It was three minutes?” Rouge asked. The kick had been straight up, and she remember how dangerously close her knee had been to her forehead during the debacle. “There’s no way it was three minutes.”

“Three and a half, but… that’s a mouthful, don’t you think?” Akshi asked. “But hey, who’s counting, right?”

”Right…” Rouge muttered. She looked at the pool and frowned. “How do I know you won’t look?” she asked.

Akshi held out his pinky. “May I swallow a thousand needles if I do. And I genuinely mean it.”

Rouge touched her pinky to his but didn’t curl it around. “Don’t leave me to myself just yet. And turn around, I need my privacy.”

“Ah, right,” he said. “I forgot the curtains though.” He walked over to a rope by the front of the structure and lazily pulled it down, allowing a set of airy blue curtains to drop and obscure the bat from the outside world. “Sorry, I should be more careful.”

Rouge sighed. “It’s fine to forget every now and again,” she said. “As long as it isn’t all the time.” The flop of her gloves sounded from behind the bird but he dared not break his promise. “This water is quite warm.”

Akshi remained facing away from her as he searched the purple rose bush nearby for a long thorn. “You wouldn’t believe how happy I am to see you,” he casually muttered.

“Huh? Is this because you know me from somewhere?” she asked. The sound of lycra and spandex coming undone followed by a slow exhale came from Rouge. 

“It’s… hard to relay in words,” he said. He carefully snapped a thorn and took a deep breath in before gently blowing on it, and it became more slender and needle-like. He pulled down a few strands of ivy and flicked them like a whip, and they unraveled into black threads. As he heard her slip into the water, he casually walked over to the bench behind her and sat down next to her removed suit before looking back to her figure, which was now submerged in the steamy water up to her clavicle bone. 

“Let’s start from the top, then,” Rouge said. “What were you saying about rose quartz as a stone?”

Akshi carefully thread the needle and held up the suit at the tear. “What were you told by Luneria when she hypnotized you?” he asked, crossing his legs and putting in the first stitch.

“What does that have to do with your stupid rock symbolism?” she huffed. The shoulders she had poking out of the water were raised to the sides of her head for a moment before dropping. They made a quiet splash as she huffed again.

“It’s related to your question,” he said. The bird smiled but continued his work. “I can answer yours more easily if you answer mine first.”

“She… she told me that what I wanted was to…” she stopped, and so did Akshi. He could see the water around her shaking a bit and she held a hand up to her mouth. “To disappear. I thought that sacrifice would be the key, so I threw myself into the action.”

Akshi sighed. “Yeah, that’s the thing about the Opal aspect of Luneria- she plays on your fears to determine what to tell you to want. It isn’t exactly what you want- it’s what _she_ wants of you.” He smiled. “She turned your body into the one thing you want most, something you can’t see when you’re trapped in here,” he said. He finished one hole and moved to the second on the other thigh.

“Why would I want a rose quartz? It’s a clear quartz dirtied with iron,” Rouge said. “There are loads of other gems I’d take before I’d even want that.”

“You don’t want a literal rose quartz, Rouge,” Akshi explained. ”You want what it represents- _love_. Unconditional, unquestionable love.” He grinned as he sewed the second hole closed. “There we go…”

“But… that’s so vague!” the bat cried.

“I know! Isn’t that wonderful!” Akshi asked.

“No!” Rouge replied sadly. “How am I supposed to know what to do with something that nebulous?”

Akshi chuckled. “Well, you won’t find out by just sitting there, will you?” He set the suit down. 

Rouge was quiet for a moment and sniffled, and Akshi frowned and played with his thumbs before speaking, trying to find the proper words. He could tell his last choice was perhaps a bit tasteless. He swallowed hard and tried again.

“Listen, I know you want more than anything to be certain, but you know _so_ well that certainty isn’t how life plays,” he said. “I mean, I wasn’t certain I’d ever be found again when I was shattered, but I was fortunate enough to have an old friend waiting. Life throws some rough curveballs at you, but it also throws you some joy every now and then.”

He reached behind him and picked a purple rose before standing up and moving towards her. He plucked away the thorns and threw them over his shoulder before kneeling behind Rouge. “And if you don’t think you have any joy…”

The bat was trembling and lost in thought, nervous that whatever he’d meant would never come to fruition. She knew she wasn’t the best person, she _knew_ that she had issues. She knew that when she tried to help she always made it about herself and no matter how hard she tried not to it just kept happening. She remembered the siren song, remembered the visions of disappearing, and contemplated it again, all from the sheer terror of not knowing how to fix it and not hurt anybody.

But her buzzing thoughts paused as she felt something string through her fur against the side of her left ear. She turned to stare at Akshi, who gently pulled his hand away and smiled at her.

“If you don’t think you have any joy, then you _make_ joy for yourself,” he said. “Whatever that might mean to you, you make joy.”

Rouge slowly pulled the flower from her head and played with it between her fingers, examining the glossy green leaves and the gentle velvet of each light purple petal. The saccharine sweetness of the rose soaked into her nose and surrounded her with its perfume.

As Akshi stood and began walking towards the exit, she turned and put her arms onto the dry ledge. She could feel the blush but she was convinced it was the heat of the bath. “Wait!” she said with one arm outstretched slightly. Her fingers reached towards the bird.

“Yes, Rouge?” Akshi asked. His head turned as he reached the doorframe, where the silhouette of his face was framed by a gold-orange hue from outside.

“Where did you first see me?” she asked. “How do you know me?”

Akshi shot her a grin and chuckled. “Ah… _you just don’t know when to give up, do you?”_

Rouge’s eyes widened and she put a hand over her mouth. The rose gracefully dropped into the water, and as the stem came to a point downwards the mauve petals remained floating on the surface like a serene water lily. In that moment she knew exactly where he’d been this whole time, and she had no words to say at that point, and so the bird took his leave.

As Akshi exited the marble pavillion, he walked right into Gold and Tails, who had been listening in. He frowned. “You two…”

“Sorry, sir,” Gold said. “We were really bored and Tails had gone around the entire island already looking for fun spots.”

“Yeah, the topography of this place is strikingly familiar,” he said. “Is this based on a real place you lived before you… you know…”

“You got me there,” he said. “Hey, I know I said tonight, but do you mind if I talk to Tails right now, Gold? I have something to ask,” he said.

“Um, sure,” she said. “But what should I do?” she asked.

The parakeet thought for a moment. “Ah, yes. If it’s not too much of a hassle, could you go get Briar for me? She’s in the flower fields.”

Tails smiled. “Due South.”

“Roger that!” Gold enthusiastically said, saluting. 

Akshi cracked a smile as she left. “You know, I can see why she’s a diamond. Real keen, real perky attitude, vibrancy to her smile. She must have come from a very dark world for a smile to stand out that much.” He paused. “Strong but brittle- extremely difficult to destroy but not impossible. Improbable, but not impossible.”

Tails frowned. “What do you mean by that?” he asked. “She’s a diamond?”

”Oh, nothing really,” Akshi mumbled. “Here, we can sit on the roof of the building here, it’s fine.”

“But my tail is still hurt,” he replied. 

Akshi’s eyes widened. “Wait, when Gold said you went around the whole island, you _walked?”_ Akshi asked. 

“Uh-Huh,” Tails said. “Good exercise though.”

“Optimism, I like it,” the bird said, kneeling down in front of the fox. “Mind if I see your tail?”

Tails gingerly grabbed one of his tails and held it to the parakeet. “It’s split at the end.”

“Surprised you didn’t bleed as much,” Akshi said. “You used the fruit for more than food, didn’t you?”

“Peppermint is a soother, so I figured it would work. Well, either that or poison me. Since the fruit didn’t kill me when I ate it, I made a few extrapolations and went for the best solution.”

“Still as sharp as ever,” Akshi said. “Hold still, this’ll probably sting for a second.” He took a breath in, and then out, and then a spark hit the fox’s tail. Tails jumped back a bit, but calmed down as he felt the pain disappear. “Sorry I didn’t do it earlier, kid,” the parakeet said. “If I’d known you’d be so locomotive I would have, I swear.”

Tails flew up to the dome and landed before finding a place to watch the sunset. The crimson colors of the sky were dotted with seagulls, and the waterline rippled the sun’s reflection as though the star were melting on a hot stove and leaving liquid trails behind. 

Akshi pulled himself up to the perch and sat beside Tails. “So, exactly how much did you hear?” he asked. “I wanna know how cryptic I wasn’t being.”

“It’s fine, you did pretty good. Let’s see, you apparently had met Rouge before, and since you know me I guess we’ve met too, but I’ve never seen you.”

“Maybe you forgot?” Akshi asked. 

“No, my memory is near photographic,” Tails replied. “And if that’s the case, then you probably didn’t look like you do now.”

“Now you’re on the right track,” Akshi assured the fox. “Getting warmer.”

“We know that you were shattered and put back together, which is why you’re stuck here, but… were you ever shattered again? You sounded so calm when you explained it.”

“Yeah,” Akshi admitted, putting his hands behind his head and leaning back. He raised his voice at the open sky above them. “And it probably won’t be the last, knowing his track record.”

“Geez, you sure are harsh on this guy,” Tails said. He has a slight glint of mischief in his eyes. “How long have you known each other?”

“Technically since he was hatched,” Akshi said. “He doesn’t really know me the way you do though. I don’t know, our dreamscapes look too… similar? Wouldn’t wanna get lost so I just don’t go there. I speak directly to him the way you did when you first arrived.”

“I see,” Tails said, pausing. “He wouldn’t happen to be fifteen right now, would he?”

Akshi stiffened. “W-why, yes he would,” he replied. “Wow, and I underestimated your intelligence for your age, Tails. Then again, most of what I know about you and your friends is passed down from him.”

“Oh no, I had my theories, I just wanted to be certain. Would hate to mistake you for another giant rock,” the fox replied with a grin. “Does Knuckles really talk about me that much? I thought he just kept to himself.”

“Oh? Maybe when he’s hanging around people, but when he’s alone with me- well, alone with what he perceives as a sentient rock- he tends to regale me with stories about your fascinating world.” Akshi sighed. “I wish I could see it more- the last time was about a day ago in your world when we synced up for a fight. Wish he’d sync up for less formal reasons.”

“Maybe once we’re outta here I can put in a good word for you,” Tails said.

“You’re a good man, Tails.” He paused. “But I know that’s not quite right either, now is it?”

Tails frowned. “I…” the words failed. They wrung their hands. “I-I don’t know what you’re—“

“Relax, you can be honest with me,” Akshi said, his face turned unyielding towards the sunset. “I already knew it.”

“You… did?” Tails said. “How?”

“You have tells, just like anybody.”

“What sort of tells?”

The parakeet sighed. “Tails, I’m not going to tell you your tells because if you know them, you’ll hide yourself even more. Did Luneria tell you to hide?” 

The fox pulled their legs closer, and the parakeet could hear the slight tremble in Tails’ voice. “Yeah, yeah she did,” they said. “She said that’s what I wanted most.”

“ _Don’t_ do that. That’s not in your stone to do so.”

“’In your… stone?’” Tails sniffled.

“I already explained it to Rouge, but I guess you weren’t eavesdropping then, so I’ll try to be clear- Luneria hides what you want most from you by turning your body, which you can’t see from in here, into that thing. Well, a representation of that thing. It’s why I pegged Gold as a diamond, earlier.” He paused, squinting at Tails’ eyes for a second. “Yep, blue topaz. Beyond a doubt.”

“What?” the fox asked. 

“You’re a blue topaz, a gem rarely found naturally on Earth. Hard to break, but not impossible. Luneria told you to hide, but your stone says the opposite,” Akshi said.

“So I should just shout it out to everyone I know?” Tails asked. “I don’t think I can do that.”

“Blue topaz is a stone of communication, not transmission. You don’t need to say it to everyone at once- come out to them one at a time. I suggest you start with someone who you know won’t judge you and will be able to physically assist with dolling you up if you feel that will make you feel better.”

Tails held their head. “I suppose so. I know someone who’d be thrilled to help, but how can I trust she won’t squeal? Especially to…” they paused, and their tears welled up. 

Akshi put a hand on their shoulder. “Tails, she’s a good friend, right?” 

Tails nodded. 

“Then she’ll understand that you need to come out on your own terms and respect that. If there’s anything I know about her from what Knuckles told me, it’s that she’s fiercely loyal, even if her loyalty makes her a bit hot-headed.”

Tails sighed. “Yeah,” they said. “But what about…”

“Baby steps, Tails. Baby steps.”

“Hey!” A voice called from below. “Mind if we join you?”

It was Gold, having returned with Briar and a strange arrangement of flowers. Akshi held his hands up and carefully felt around for their presence. His hands glowed a gentle green before he lifted them onto the dome with his powers. “Sorry it took so long, Briar wanted to play hide and seek and I couldn’t resist that cute lil face!” the tenrec said, pinching the cat’s cheek. “How is Tails, is she doing okay?”

The fox perked up and turned to look at her with a widened gaze. “Did… d-did you just…?”

“She’s fine, just a little worried about how to break the news to her friends is all,” Akshi said. 

“You too?” Tails said. Her eyes filled with tears. “I… I…”

Briar carefully walked over and smiled. “Don’t cry! Here, we made this so you’d feel better.” The cat gently placed a crown of flowers on Tails’ head. “There, now you’ve been made even prettier!” she said with a grin. 

“Not that you weren’t already,” Gold added with a smile.

Tails sniffled. “You guys…” 

“Hey,” Akshi said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “You heard the little lady, Tails. No crying allowed.”

The fox wiped her tears and sat up straight. “I’m trying, I’m just… I’m happy and I’m scared at the same time.”

“You don’t have to be,” a deeper voice called. The group turned to see Rouge, who’d put on her suit again, flapping gently as her boots clicked on the roof. “If things go wonky, I’ll make a space for you if you need it. My home isn’t exactly small, you know,” she said. “The government pays handsomely for a top agent.”

Tails grinned. “Rouge, I…” She stood up and tackled Rouge in a hug, nearly sending both of them off the dome. 

“Take it easy kid, you’re gonna get us both killed,” the bat said.

Tails sniffled and wiped her tears away. “Rouge, you’re now the first one of my usual friends who knows. How does it feel?”

“It feels…” she turned and looked at Akshi, who raised an eyebrow. She looked back to the fox and patted her head. “It feels like an honor. By the way, nice flower crown.”

Akshi smirked. “And so sets another sun,” he said, pointing to the horizon. The sun had dipped below, and as the night came on, little lanterns lit up the sky from a distance.

“I didn’t expect you of all people to wax poetic,” the bat said.

“Eh, you’re gonna have to do better if you wanna be original,” the parakeet said. “That purple boy’s got you beat there.”

“Did he say that first?”

“Yep, right before I was broken again,” Akshi said. “That was a weird Tuesday.”

“It was a Saturday,” Rouge flatly replied. 

“Well it was Tuesday for me, but then again every day could possibly be Tuesday. Being stuck in here for thousands of years can drive you bonkers, I swear.”

“Batty, perhaps?” Rouge said slyly.

“Watch it with the puns!” Akshi laughed, playfully poking her.

Rouge stopped for a moment. “Ah, Sylphic… right.” She called into the sky with both of her hands to her face. “Syll, can you hear me? It’s Rouge! I’m in a safe zone with the others!”

Gold simultaneously pressed down the button on her device. “Silver, this is Gold,” she said. “Do you read me?”

 _“Gold?”_ Silver said. His voice crackled and there was rumbling happening in the background. _“Can’t talk now, gotta avoid—“_ the voice got abruptly cut off, sending Gold into a short panic.

From the sky, a voice called back. _“Chaos Emerald signature detected from pink gem. Initiating playback. Disabling unit audio input and rerouting to signal.”_


	12. Closing In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bastette throws another obstacle into the path of the Team in the form of a rapidly closing space. With the Team worn out from all the time wasted climbing stairs and exhausting any energy from those who have a surplus, their options are limited. But one of them has a trick up their sleeve from their home dimension.

As Silver reached the top of the stairs, he looked around the room. Unlike the others, it was square in shape and exceptionally tall, though there was no real ceiling, just an open roof. A figure floated high above with a dress that hung down twenty feet past her legs, and she sported a long pointytail of vermillion-orange hair that seemed to defy gravity as it floated. 

“Well,” the figure said. “You made it. I thought my little puzzle would stump you given the lack of brains in your little menagerie.”

“Luneria!” Nyx called. “That Eye is ours.”

“Bold of you to assert your ownership of my body, insect,” Luneria hissed. “If you weren’t a peon to your duties you’d see the error of such a command.”

“Big talk for someone with a short temper,” Sonic said. “Listen, if you don’t mind, we have a friend to rescue. We can do this the easy way or the hard way.”

“The easy way isn’t really an option though, is it?” the looming figure replied.

Omega looked at her. _“Likelihood of mercy: 0%.”_

“Don’t tell me the odds,” Sonic said.

 _“I said mercy, not victory,”_ Omega replied. He aimed at Bastette with his arm. ” _Lethal force engaged.”_

Luneria smirked. Bastette’s once gentle red eyes were now shining like a radio tower light, and as she tilted her head and raised her arm, they streaked. “Too slow,” she said, firing a crystal spike from her hand and severing one of Omega’s limbs.

Shadow’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t touch my friend!” he shouted.

Luneria’s gaze shifted to him. “Tough words for a loner,” she said, aiming again. “I can’t have you making a mess of my plans, hybrid, so let’s _put a pin in this_ , shall we?”

Shadow hissed as a spike fired into his shoulder and pinned him to the ground in a kneel. He pushed against the side of it and gritted his teeth, but as his arm began to cramp he realized he still wasn’t at full strength. As he reached for one of his inhibitors, he saw Luneria fire another shot at Omega and tear off his remaining arm. He managed to get the first inhibitor off thanks to the rage induced by the assault on his friend.

“Now where were we?” Luneria said. “Oh yeah, the last task.”

Silver swallowed hard as he felt a rumbling around him. “What’s going on?”

Knuckles pointed up at the walls. “They’re moving, that’s what!” he said. He ran over to one of them and punched into it, only managing to make a dent in it but not a single crack- whatever it was, the material was ductile. He resorted to pushing against the wall with as much strength as he could, but before he could manage to stop his feet from sliding backwards, the speed picked up slightly, and he was pushed back into panic mode. 

Shadow struggled with his other ring, but as soon as it slipped off, the gold aura surrounding him intensified and crackled like a firework. He pushed against the wall opposite to Knuckles, again only managing to stop the wall for a mere second. “This isn’t enough!” he shouted. “We’re gonna be pancakes at this rate!”

Silver took a steady breath and pushed his arms out in both directions. His aura encompassed a part of the walls as he tried to concentrate in the hysteria. “Focus…” he muttered. “Just like the Second Devourer- way bigger than you, still not a problem.”

The walls stopped, and Silver was panting but still applying his full strength.

 _“Silver, this is Gold, do you read me?”_ came a voice from the ITCH. Immediately his focus was broken, and the walls continued inward. _Darn it,_ the hedgehog thought to himself.

“Gold?” he said, looking around and the rapidly closing space. “Can’t talk right now, gotta avoid—“

He cut himself off as he looked down at his device, where he read the letters “BMM”. He grinned and held the communication button down. “Gold, I’m gonna go silent, don’t worry.”

 _“Chaos Emerald signature detected from pink gem. Initiating playback. Disabling unit audio input and rerouting to signal,”_ Omega said.

“Huh?” Shadow said, losing his grip. “A pink gem…”

A familiar voice called out. _“Syll? Can you hear me?”_

“Rouge?” Shadow said, frowning. “Rouge, Sylphic put you inside Omega’s containment for safekeeping, it seems.” He pushed on the wall again, putting his power into full torque. “Ironically this is... an extremely dangerous position to be in right now,” he grunted.

 _“What’s happening out there?”_ she asked.

“The walls… are closing in… we’re gonna get crushed.” His powers flickered out like a blown bulb. He snapped his inhibitors back on.

Silver leaned against one of the walls and held his foot out. “Not if I can help it.”

Sonic tried to run along the wall but slipped down from how smooth its surface was. He landed next to Silver with a thud. “Okay, but you already tried your powers and they didn’t work.”

“I'm not at max power,” he said. “Sonic, everyone- stand back.” He pressed down on the button and felt the jolt of electricity ripple down his body as Omega scooted backwards armless, and the rest of the team did their best to steer clear.

Sonic looked at Silver, who gave him a smirk. “Nothing happened, Silver,” the blue blur said.

“Oh, right- wait for it.” Silver smirked. 

About a second after he’d spoke, Silver felt his body getting more and more crushed by the space around him. He knew that it wasn’t the walls though, as he saw his teammates quickly shrinking below him as they stared wide-eyed and slack jawed at the spectacle. 

He was pretty sure anyone would be frightened at watching a teammate grow 75 feet taller than normal.

“Whoa…” Sonic said, staring up at the white hedgehog like a child would to a four-story jungle gym. “That’s so cool!”

Silver pushed slightly against the walls with his powers as he remained propped between them with his back and his foot. “It’s not gonna be cool if you don’t get out of there,” he said, his voice echoing over them. He held his right hand down. “Climb up,” he said. “I have an idea.”

One by one they began climbing up Silver’s arm to his shoulder.

He looked to Luneria, whose hold on Bastette was still tight. “Who’s the insect now?” he said, swiping his hand at her.

She easily dodged. “You still are,” she said, firing a spike into his neck. 

Silver hissed as his power diminished, but he pulled the spike out before it could sink in. He plucked up Omega’s arms and his body and placed it on top of the floor above before pushing hard against the wall with his body. “Guys, I can’t hold out much longer,” he said, scooping them up from his shoulder with his hand and carefully dumping them onto the roof. “The Professor said six minutes, and it’s more like two or three!”

“It’s gonna be fine, just keep breathing! All you need to do is get up here with us,” Knuckles said, dusting himself off.

Silver grunted. “Enough of this!” he shouted. His body sent out a teal wave of light across the now-visible city below, and the lights of the buildings flickered for a moment. A few dozen alarms whined across the landscape, piercing the wind with their shrill cries. His fingers gripped the pseudo-ceiling as it came close to shutting as he watched the seconds go down, and he swore he could hear the faint buzz of something airborne above him.

Another shock went through his system, and he felt his leg move away from the wall as he shrunk back to normal. By instinct he quickly reacted to the wall shutting below and flung himself onto the roof of the tower. 

“Nice job!” Sonic grabbed his hand and helped him up. “I don’t suppose you could show me how that thing works later, could you?” he asked. “Looked like a lot of fun.”

“Heh, maybe another time,” Silver replied. “I’m afraid that was the only use I get.”

“Well, we’re thankful you saved it for something important,” Knuckles said, giving him a pat on the back. Silver stumbled forward from how hard he’d been hit but smiled sheepishly with a look of innocent pride.

Shadow moved over to Omega as he was still shaken by the dismemberment of his friend. “Rouge, Omega’s badly damaged, I don’t know how we’re—“

 _“Don’t worry, I can fix him,”_ Tails said through the communications line. _“Might take me a while but I can definitely get him working.”_

“Tails?” Shadow asked. “But how…?”

 _“No time to explain,”_ the fox said. _“We’ll talk_ _after you save ‘Tette.”_

Shadow stood up and looked towards Luneria, who was still levitating above them. “Are you done with this pointless game? You’re going to pay for what you did to Omega!”

“You think I’m done with that little heap of scrap metal?” Luneria replied. “Let me fix that.”

Shadow leapt forward and kicked a bolt she’d sent towards Omega’s head, sending it hurtling to the streets below. A second and a third came, and they both got kicked away.

One of them landed by Sonic a mere foot from him. It was about the size of a tennis shoe but was scorching hot on impact. He hissed as he felt the heat of it and moved away. “Hey Shadz, do you mind _not_ throwing them toward us?”

“I don’t exactly control where they land when I’m playing defensively!” Shadow yelled back.

Knuckles picked the stone up and hurled it at Luneria, who felt the impact square in the chest. Her arms and legs lurched backwards as did her head, but the silence was momentary as she began laughing in a sickly and painful chortle. Another rumble came from below, this time deeper and more akin to a generator powering up.

“Did you think you came up here just to have a beat down?” Luneria asked. “I’ll weaponize what you value most.”

Sonic felt a shudder go down his spine as a series of rough-cut gems rose from the floor and floated lazily around the perimeter of the roof. They were a few hundred in numbers and shaded many hues, and their orbit was slow and methodical like a circling pack of wolves. “What’re those?” the blue hedgehog asked, shivering. “Why do they make me feel so bad?”

Knuckles gasped for breath as the feeling brought him to his knees, feeling the energy from them as well. “Are those… no it can’t be… there are too many of them for… ugh…” he slammed his fist into the ground. “I can’t hear anything!”

Silver and Nyx only felt a slight pain but were nonetheless concerned. Nyx began making her way over to Knuckles, and Silver went to Shadow, but was waved away. “But—“

“I can handle myself!” the black hedgehog called. “Focus on him!”

Shadow was gritting his teeth and trying not to break under the pressure of that much negative energy. Those were fake Emeralds- hundreds of them. Save wavelength and properties, and for all Shadow understood they emitted an energy so foul and dark that they’d made regular people like Sonic feel sick. And Shadow, who’d never really known many sick feelings, was beginning to grow inwardly distressed by the foreign emotion squirming through his insides.

“What are you trying to do? Tempt me with power? Torture me?” Shadow said, kicking away another bolt. “I don’t break.”

“Is that so?” Luneria said, flicking her hand up.

Shadow stopped dead as he felt a cold spike come from behind and pierce him from back to front in his stomach. He groaned really loud as he felt the crystal inside him spreading through his organs like frost. He wanted to scream, but just when he felt he could no longer keep it in, he stopped and felt his body go numb from the pain. He knew he’d survive this- he always did, but if she wasn’t trying to kill him, then… what was the aim?

Luneria’s aim paid off as she struck Omega’s left side, toppling him over and causing a good portion of his body to unravel and clatter apart. The rose quartz held inside clinked gently on the ground, and it was then that Shadow noticed a small chip near the top. “Rouge?” he breathed, barely able to speak without a crimson wetness pooling in his mouth. The chip sent his worries into overdrive.

“She _told_ you to get that flaw fixed, Omega. Tsk tsk, what a shame.” Her eyes locked on Shadow again. “Looks like you _can_ be broken,” Luneria said. “Only one more thing to break.” She shaped a lance. “It’s time for the bat to go bye-bye,” she said with a sick grin.

As she hurled the weapon towards the helpless pendant, Shadow felt an emotion he never expected to see again- terror. He tried to reach out for it, but the pendant was just out of reach. He refused to give up, even willing to let his hand be skewered if it meant keeping his friend alive. _Anything_ to keep her alive.

But in a flash, a second lance came down and knocked it away, and a familiar pair of blue and gold shoes touched down with grace. The ice lance curled into a ball of water and hovered there for a moment before returning to its owner.

“Sorry for dropping in like that,” Sylphic said. He looked at Shadow, who was trying to grab at Rouge, and picked the stone up. He paused for a moment, eyes flicking back and forth. “Looks like she took damage. Rouge, can you hear me?” he said.


	13. All Chips on Black

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Team gathers to take Bastette- or rather, Luneria- down, only to find that they might be outmatched by an even darker force than the ancient spirit.

Somehow, some way, Rouge hadn’t died. The jarring fall had resounded through her gem, which in turn had made her dizzy and fall off the roof and into the rose bush below.

Akshi pulled her out and took a look at her as the other girls gathered around. He brushed the purple petals away from her hair and began feeling at her limbs. “No broken bones, a ton of scratches that I can easily fix and…” His fingers stopped as he looked above her face. “Oh, oh no…”

His trembling fingers traced a clip in her left ear that hadn’t been there before. Triangular and clean, no blood. He cupped his hands over it and breathed in. “Chaos… Control…” he whispered.

Nothing changed. He drew his hands back, wondering what was wrong with him, when Rouge groggily woke up. “What… what happened?” she asked, trying to stand.

Akshi held her upright. “Easy… um…”

“Am I dead yet? Am I stuck here?” she asked, nervous at the sight of his worried expression. “Spit it out.”

“Well no, but…” the parakeet said. “I think you were chipped.”

Tails put a hand to her chin. “Is that why her ear’s different?”

Akshi frowned. “Tails…” he spoke through his teeth.

“Sorry.”

Rouge felt at her ear and sniffled. “I…”

Akshi grimaced. “Rouge, it’s not that bad,” he said. 

“Not that bad? _Not that bad?_ I’m damaged!” she yelled. “What would you know about damage?” 

Akshi remained silent and looked away. Rouge frowned in return.

 _“Rouge, can you hear me?”_ a voice called.

The bat looked towards the sky. “Syll, is that you? Great timing! What happened out there?”

 _“Omega took a nasty tumble,”_ Sylphic replied. _“You’re missing a piece, too.”_

Tails ran up. “Are his boards still functional? No splits?” she asked. 

_“Whoa, is that… Tails?”_ Sylphic asked. _“What’s Tails doing there? How is that even—“_

“I’ll explain later. Where’s the damage?” the fox said.

 _“Looks like the motherboard is alright, a lot of the damage was on the outer shell but Omega’s been rendered non-operational like this.”_ There was a short pause. _“Are you sure you’re okay, Rouge?”_

“I’m fine,” Rouge said, a little irritated. “I’m still me.”

 _“Good, good. Things aren’t looking so good here with Shadow, either. He’s taken some heavy damage, too.”_ The medic paused. _“Um… Shadow?”_

Rouge frowned. “What’s wrong with him?" 

_“He’s… flickering.”_ Sylphic shuddered. _“Ugh, what is that awful feeling?”_

Shadow’s voice was ragged. _“Those Emeralds... around the perimeter… they’re all fakes. They… they emit a negative pulse or something.”_

Rouge bit her lip as Shadow groaned.

 _"Gotta… stay calm… no, Omega, I…”_ the black hedgehog echoed.

“Syll, tell him I’m alright,” Rouge said, trying to disguise her panic.

 _“Oh boy, looks like we got company.”_ There was a paused before Rouge felt a strange change in the wind. _“Shadow,” the hybrid said. “She’s fine. Hang onto her for me.”_

The bat pursed her lips. She knew her friend couldn’t hear her, but she wanted badly to comfort him. Whatever was happening was clearly instigated by her friend. “It’s gonna be alright, Shadow- keep breathing.”

* * *

Sylphic swallowed his spit as he stood up. “Looks like you’ve been having fun tonight, Bastette,” he said. “That’s a new look for you.”

Luneria narrowed her eyes. “You…” she growled.

Sylphic yelped as she shot a crystal lance at him. He barely managed to dodge as it stuck and buried itself in the roof. The hybrid frowned at the heat that came off it for a moment.

“ _You,_ ” Luneria hissed. “You were the one who brought my world down.”

“Bastette, don’t listen to her! She’s using your grief!” Sylphic said. 

“I’m doing what I must,” she replied, hurtling another lance. “I’m going to exterminate you so you can never break another heart again.”

Sylphic sighed. “Alright, if that’s how you wanna play, then let’s dance.” He formed his spare water into a halberd. “Dance for me.”

Bastette screamed, breaking from Luneria’s grip for a moment. “Sylphic, no, she—“

Another lance fell as the spirit regained her control. “Very well. When the waltz ends, death will be more desirable.”

Sylphic jumped as a set of small walls came up beside him from the floor and slammed together, and with part of his spare water he lifted himself higher like a trampoline and swung at her. The assailant responded with a weapon of her own pulling a quick block and locking her weapon with his.

Sonic looked over at Knuckles. “Throw me,” he said. 

The echidna nodded and grinned as he put his hands together. “Silver?”

The white hedgehog nodded. “I think I got a plan.”

Knuckles grinned as Sonic perched on his hands. “3, 2, 1…”

Sonic soared through the air as Luneria continued to hold Sylphic in a lock and balled up. “Hey lady, let’s take your multitasking for a spin, shall we?” he said, bursting forward.

Luneria frowned and pulled a shield out as the blue blur approached, but as he hit her cover, it shattered under the pressure, as did her weapon, and she was left open at two angles.

Knuckles felt his hands freeze up as Luneria pulled a pillar in front of him and coated his arms in crystal. “Guys, watch ou—“

Silver came from behind and grabbed at her hand, trying to yank the stone from her head but to no avail. Instead, it sunk even deeper, just barely peeking out from under her skin. Luneria wailed and produced a glittering dagger, which she dug into Silver’s side before casting him away.

“Enough!” Luneria screamed, and her voice erupted from her throat like a siren. Sonic and Sylphic were knocked back onto the ground from the sudden turn of the tables. Sylphic rolled a bit and his canteen came unhooked from his belt and clattered against the roof, and Sonic managed to land but fell forward as he felt his feet freeze over, encased in a layer of rock. Knuckles continued to tug and tug to get his arms out.

Silver pulled himself off the ground, and the handle of the dagger broke and fell to the ground before shattering. The shard that was left sunk in, and before long, Silver was on the ground, drained of his powers. Nyx, having been paralyzed with fear, finally broke from her frozen state and fell to her knees, trying to get Silver to get up.

Shadow began to pull his hand towards the inhibitor, but Luneria was quick to see this and shot another spike at him, this time skewering him right in his uninhibited forearm. Shadow cursed under his breath and shook from the returning feeling of pain.

Sylphic went to grab his canteen when a lance struck it, piercing straight through. The water trickled out into a puddle and dried from the lance’s heat.

“You all deserve this,” Luneria said. 

Sylphic swallowed. “I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t want to break the news to you, but—“

“This is my fault,” Shadow said. 

Bastette stopped for a moment. “What?” she said, turning. Her eyes no longer glowed. 

“I didn’t want you to know at the time but I drew connections between you two like I did with Maria, and I thought that if you were gonna find out you should hear it from me. Syll was a wreck, he didn’t want to hurt you. But by telling you the truth, _I_ hurt you. I shouldn’t have called you childish, I shouldn’t have yelled at you.” He paused and swallowed the blood that had come to his mouth before hissing at the pain. “Misery loves company, and I inflicted you with the same misery I had for so long. I’m…” 

Sylphic saw his friend shaking. “Shadow…”

Shadow screamed to her. “Bastette, _I’m sorry_!”

The spikes retracted from Shadow’s chest, and he fell forward onto the cold floor. He sat there for a minute as his body rapidly healed itself, contemplating what would have possessed him to say that string of words. He knew he’d possibly done her wrong by being indelicate, and definitely did her wrong by telling her to act like an adult. But all the same, he felt like he had to shoulder the burden because he’d been there.

Sylphic tried to help him off the floor, but he shook his head and silently slid the pink gem over to him. “Don’t worry about me. Keep her safe.”

The hybrid nodded, but just as he took the crystal, a spike came back up and pushed through Shadow again, this time from the front.

“Finally, I can get rid of that pesky friend of his,” Luneria said.

Sylphic turned and looked at her. “You’re still not done?” he asked.

“You’re still standing, it won’t be over.”

Sylphic hung the pink gem around his neck. “Then what’s your plan?” he asked. “Because I won’t rest until you stop. You were wrong about your family. You were wrong about the cure. You were wrong to do this to your friends.”

Bastette came through again, her tone now melancholy, but it was overlapped with the spirit’s voice. The Opal slipped below her fur and disappeared, now completely covered, and a red symbol of an eye appeared over her forehead and stared oppressively onto her opponents. 

She curled her fists. “Then I don’t wanna be right.”

A series of spikes shot out from in front of Sylphic, attempting to skewer him, but the hybrid flipped back and slid along the roof. But as he came to a stop and leaned back, he lost his footing and was sent falling to the streets below.

Or at least it _should_ have been streets. He looked down below, where he started making out distinct points of rock and began to panic. But as he was contemplating his oncoming demise he reached into his belt, where he drew out a familiar stone wrapped in a large picture. 

A familiar sensation overwhelmed him as the stone around his neck twinkled a bit. “Rouge what is it? I’m kinda… falling to my doom.”

He couldn’t hear her well, but he could just make out from the heart what she wanted to say.

_“I have a plan.”_

* * *

Rouge looked at the others before shouting back into the sky. “Falling is perfectly fine by me if you're ready to die.”

 _“Are you crazy? You’re gonna get both of us killed! There’s no way your stone will survive an impact at this velocity!”_ Sylphic replied. 

“Omega mentioned something when he rerouted communications for me a while back,” she said. “He said there was a Chaos Emerald signal coming from my stone.”

_“Please don’t tell me that—“_

“Do you wanna die?” Rouge asked. “Do you want _me_ to die?”

_“Well, no but… I can’t focus! How do I pull it off if I can’t focus?”_

Akshi put a hand on his left hip. “Hey, kid, remember me?”

_“Whoa, I… you sound… or I guess feel? You feel familiar.”_

“Listen, that’s not important- you don’t _do_ Chaos Control- you _feel_ it. That’s why it’s chaos- it isn’t methodical.” Akshi said. “Besides, you’re gonna have a boost.”

Rouge looked at the bird. “What? How?”

Akshi nodded. “Because you and I are gonna do this with him.”

_“Whoever you are, you’re really clouding my senses here. I have less than thirty seconds.”_

Akshi stood behind Rouge and breathed out. “Are you ready?”

“I… I’ve never done this, I don’t even know what that would feel like to pull off Chaos Control,” she said. "Can I even pull it off at all?" 

“Don’t worry, you’ll know it when you feel it.” He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Alright!” He shouted. “Chaos…”

 _”Chaos…”_ the voice called from above.

“Chaos…" Rouge nervously whispered. She was so frightened- if this failed, she’d be trapped here forever, unable to see her friends ever again. Unable to see _anybody_ ever again. Her treasure hunting days would truly be over.

But a warm feeling crawled along the crook of her ear, the familiar feeling of a stem of a rose sliding through her fur. She looked up with a firm resolve and shouted to the sky with the loudest hopeful shout she could muster. “Control!”

And then, it was quiet. For a moment, Rouge feared the worst and began to panic, but as she turned to face Akshi to find some sort of physical comfort from the closest warm body she could, he pointed into the sky. 

_“Bastette!”_ Sylphic called. _“You need to know the truth!”_

Rouge’s fear melted away and she tackled the bird to the ground. “We did it!” she said. “We did it! We pulled it off together!”

Akshi was about to smile, when a shout resounded through the sky. A new voice, sweet and small like an innocent child.

_“Sylphic, dont—“_

Rouge looked at the sky and trembled a little bit before looking back to Akshi. Something deep inside her felt very wrong, and as she looked back, Akshi’s eyes widened in horror.

A long, deep crack had begun slowly creeping down her face.

* * *

Nyx opened her eyes. She’d thrown herself with all the strength her powers gave her into the path of a spike that Bastette had fired like a beam. She’d hoped to take his place. But as her eyes adjusted to the early morning light, she saw that the beam had intentionally forked away from her.

“Why?” she whispered. 

She turned around and stared at Sylphic, who was slack as the end of the spike pierced his chest and held him limp in the air. He dropped the Sapphire in his left hand and his eyes went dark as he exhaled his last words. “I’m sorry, Rouge…”

Knuckles jumped as a stone fell by his feet- a pink crystal, broken in two. He frantically pulled until the pillar his arms were trapped in shattered, and he rushed over to scoop up the broken pieces. The necklace chain had snapped, but it looked as though the pieces hadn’t been shattered from the ground.

“Bullseye,” Luneria said, drawing back her spike. Sylphic’s limp body fell to the ground, to Shadow’s left, and the action knocked Nyx back to the ground on her head, knocking her out cold.

Shadow stared directly at him, unmoving, comprehending what had happened before he heard sniffling from his right. He looked over to see Knuckles holding the broken stone in a pair of trembling hands. He felt his vision getting darker, his heartbeat growing louder, and a droning whine sounding through his skull and ringing in his ears.

But rather than cry, he did something even more terrifying.

His frown turned to a grin as he shook with painful glee, and he laughed.


	14. Enriched by the Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Rouge faces the worst to happen to her, Shadow loses sight of everything in a moment of pure, unadulterated rage.

Akshi stared at Rouge. The crack was only getting worse and worse as she stared up at him.

“Guess that’s it then, huh?” the bat said. “The bat was no match for the cat.”

“No,” Akshi breathed. “No, no, no no no, Rouge? Stay with me. Stay. Don’t go, it’s not your time… you still haven’t found what you wanted...”

Tails and Gold shook intensely. “Rouge…” Tails said, trying to hold back her tears. “You’re… broken.”

“She’s been shattered,” Akshi said. “It’s only a matter of minutes before she fades away.”

Rouge felt something wet hit her face, but only barely registered it through the intense numbness that encompassed her. “Are you… crying?” she asked. 

Akshi looked away. “No, I… I didn’t protect you!”

Rouge softly smiled and touched his face, trying to reassure him that everything was gonna be alright. “How are _you_ supposed to protect me from in here?” she asked.

Akshi’s eyes widened, and as he wiped away his tears he called out to the sky.

“Guardian, can you hear my call?” His lungs almost felt like they would tear at how loud he spoke.

* * *

Sonic felt a swirling around him and stared at the emeralds around the perimeter. “What’s going on? What is this?” He looked over to Shadow and watched as his red stripes faded slowly to a burgundy black. “Shadow?”

The black hedgehog didn’t even acknowledge him as he continued his laughter. His eyes were still the bright red they had been before, but a new fire seemed to be kindled within them. And there were no stones surrounding this fire either- it was as clear as day that Shadow’s thoughts were now uncontrolled and unchecked, like a flame in a forest after an intense drought.

“That’s what you wished for... isn’t it?” he said, still laughing. “For me to understand your pain, for me to…”

Luneria grinned. “So are _you_ going to take it like an adult?” she said. She flicked her arm and a pair of glittering golems rose from the surface of the roof. “How does it feel?”

“It feels _good_ ,” he said, his voice raspy and chilled. His spines turned upwards, and a black swirling mist closely surrounded him. Shadow cracked a twisted grin. “It’ll feel even better when I’m done,” he said. The intense energy from the fake emeralds left the floating stones blackened, and a burst of power from Shadow crackled the floor beneath him.

“Oh?” Luneria said, drawing up more soldiers from the ground. “Done with what?”

Shadow’s breathing was staggered as he attempted to hide the look of painful euphoria beneath a focused intentful glare. _“Done making you wish you could die.”_

The spike through his body crumbled like a cracker as he stood up, and Sonic watched as his remaining inhibitor broke into pieces and clinked against the stone roof. The power surging within now was left unrestrained and the awful feeling Sonic had before was increased tenfold.

Shadow slowly walked forward as he brushed the dust from his shoulders. “Tell me, do you want your arms to go first, or your legs?” He flicked his hand at one of the approaching crystalline figures, and immediately a Chaos Spear cut it cleanly down the middle. “Maybe one of each?”

“Shadow!” Sonic shouted, trying to unstick his feet. “What are you doing?”

Silver came to and looked towards his friend. “Sonic look out!” he said. He thrust his hand forward, but to no avail- his powers were useless. He looked to his right, where he saw Nyx lying on the ground, and stood up and went to pick her up.

One of the golems was less than a few feet from him, and he already knew that if he didn’t move, Sonic was going to get flattened like a pancake. He continued to struggle with getting his feet out from being buried. His ankles normally didn’t ache but he was certain that the crystal was close to cutting into his legs.

As the beast wound up, a crash sounded from above, and Knuckles, with one hand occupied with Rouge’s stone, punched through the figure with his remaining hand. He pulled his friend up, dislodging him from the floor with a firm tug, and Sonic noticed that there were tears flowing down his friend’s face, though his expression was hardly close to anything sorrowful.

“Whoa, Knuckles…” Sonic said. “Why are you crying?”

“I don’t know, I’m just crying, and I can’t stop…” he said. Gently, he uncurled his other hand and showed Sonic the cleaved crystal.

“Oh no…” Sonic said. “Is she…?”

Knuckles couldn’t nod or shake his head. “She’s fading fast. And there’s nothing we—“ He stopped for a moment, eyes wide with surprise.

“What is it?” Sonic asked. 

“It’s the Master Emerald,” he replied. “It’s calling me from this far.”

Sonic nodded. “It must be for a good reason.” He stood up. “Silver, we gotta stop Shadow from getting too close to ‘Tette. Who knows what sort of damage he’ll do.”

Silver nodded and ran over to them. “Nyx, I know you’re out cold but stay here.” He set her down, and she stirred slightly.

* * *

Akshi was crying buckets at this point. “Guardian,” he said. “I apologize f-for your tears, they are but my own.”

 _“What? But how can a gem cry?”_ Knuckles replied. _“Unless…”_

“Can he hear me?” Tails asked. 

“I’m afraid not, this connection is drawn by the gift endowed by my powers. If he were within close proximity to my body, perhaps, but… he obviously isn’t.”

 _“Who are you talking to?”_ Knuckles asked.

Rouge felt the crack extend below her left breast. It cracked through her clothes as well, as though it were all made of porcelain. “I… I don’t know if…”

Tails held her hand. “Hang in there,” she said.

“Guardian, I ask of you to do for her what you do for me when I am broken,” Akshi said. “It will come at a price but a price that can easily pay for itself. Will you accept?”

_“I… I don’t know… I mean, she always harassed me and…”_

“Please,” Akshi said. “I… I…”

 _“What’s wrong? Why are you acting strange?”_ Knuckles asked.

“Please... save Rouge.” The words fell from Akshi’s mouth like a weak snowflake.

 _“What?”_ the echidna asked, taken aback by the lack of formality. Knuckles took a deep breath in, attempting to regain professionalism. _“What is this price?”_

The crack ran down to her stomach. Akshi held her even closer.

“You have to find my pieces again. In the process of reviving her, I will shatter from the strain of my powers,” he said. “It’s the price for such miracles.”

“ _Understood. I agree.”_

Rouge became surprised, but she had no energy to reach her arm up again. “Akshi, you shouldn’t… you’ll… you’ll…”

Akshi put a finger up. “Shhh… I’ve been broken before. And I’ll be broken again. I’m not afraid of that.”

“Then what are you afraid of?” she asked.

Akshi looked at her for a moment and smiled. “Guardian,” he shouted, turning his head up. “I’m ready.”

 _“The servers are the seven Chaos…”_ Knuckles began. _“Chaos is power.”_

Akshi smiled and looked down at the bat in his arms. “Power enriched by the heart,” he continued. The cracks began to seal up, and he felt a vibration resound through him. He didn’t fear the sensation and he knew it well. The memory of breaking apart no longer stung like it had thousands of years ago. “The controller is the one that unifies the Chaos.”

 _“With the power of the Master Emerald,”_ Knuckles said _, “turn back the hand of fate, and bring Rouge the Bat back to us.”_

As the cracks disappeared, Rouge looked up at Akshi. Now _his_ face was cracking instead.

"Akshi!” she said, sitting up. She fumbled a bit in worry. “Akshi, I… why did you do that for me?”

“It isn’t your time yet,” he said. He clutched his stomach as he felt a crack form along his waist. “You still have to find the love you need to be happy. You deserve that.”

“But what if I can’t find it?” she asked. “What if I never find it?”

“You’ll find it,” he said. He sat up straight and smiled. “I believe you’ll find it. If I believe with you, it’ll be enough.”

She snickered. “Is that what your stone means?” she said. “That sounds so…”

“Stupid, I know.” Akshi sighed. “No, it means something else.”

“Then what does it mean?” she asked.

Akshi paused and looked around for a moment. Then his smiling eyes came back to focus on her. “That our fates may cross again one day, just like today,” he said. 

“Okay, now I know you’re making things up,” Rouge said, lightly pushing on his shoulder.

“It was worth a shot.” The bird sighed. “Can you do me a favor? It isn’t a huge ask but it might be for someone of your caliber.”

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?” she said. 

“No, I just know how you operate,” he said. A crack fell across his eye and froze it shut, but other emerald hue remained fixed on her. “If you could help him find the last pieces of my body, that would be really swell. He gets... distracted sometimes.”

Rouge chuckled. “And how do you know I won’t just hold you hostage?” she said. 

“Because I wanna see you again,” he said firmly.

She looked at him and chuckled. “You just don’t know when to give up, do you?”

“I never will.” A tear fell down his cheek, but he was far from sad. "Take care of yourself, okay?"

Rouge pursed her lips as he crumbled away. He didn’t break apart like glass as expected- it was more like fine quartz sand. She felt it through her fingers as she rubbed them together and stoically sighed. “And that’s that, I suppose…” she muttered with downturned eyes.

Tails helped her up. “Well,” she said. “Can’t wait for this place to disintegrate.”

Gold and Rouge turned to her.

“What? Did you not hear him?” she said, adjusting her flower crown. “This place is made from his thoughts. Hard to have thoughts when you’re broken apart.”

The ground below them gave way to a black space beneath their feet, and Rouge quickly grabbed Briar. “Tails, get Gold. We have to get to Bastette’s world again!”

“Yeah, figured,” the fox replied. She gripped the tenrec’s arms. “Hang on tight!”

Rouge looked up to the sky. “Knuckles!” she called. “Get moving! Get me to Shadow so he knows I’m okay!”

 _“Geez, bossy much?”_ Knuckles rang out. _“What was that? How did it call you by name?”_

“Not now,” Rouge said, still shaken as she and Tails circled towards the white of Bastette’s space.

* * *

Luneria continued building creature after creature in an attempt to slow Shadow down, but as he approached, her attempts were becoming more frantic.

“You can’t run forever,” Shadow said. “I _will_ catch up, and then I’ll fulfill my end of the bargain.”

She hissed. “I’ll just keep throwing obstacles then, until you give up.”

“You seriously think that I’ll give up once this feeling wears off?” Shadow said. “Cute.” He disappeared for a second and returned to his spot, and every one of the creatures broke into chunks. “Are you getting the picture yet?”

“Shadow!” Silver shouted. “What you’re doing isn’t right!” he said.

“What would you know about it? You didn’t watch your friends die. You didn’t watch them suffer.” His voice was eerily calm, as though the pain of it all was off in the distance, tied around Shadow’s wrist like a kite and trailing behind him, unable to catch up.

“That doesn’t mean you should take it out on others.” Silver widened his stance. “That would make you no better than them.”

“Should a murderer be punished for their actions or not?” Shadow asked, pausing his steady walk and locking eyes with the white hedgehog. “Go on, let’s see if you have some excuse to justify what she did to her.”

Sonic piped up. “You’re better than that. What about the world? All the people you saved?”

“They were innocent,” Shadow replied. “She isn’t.”

Sonic sped in front of Shadow and held his arms out. “But she isn’t herself.”

“I don’t care!” Shadow shouted, grabbing him by the arm and throwing him. “I’m done with showing mercy when she was so selfish!”

Sonic rolled and stopped. He grunted as he shakily pushed himself off the ground. “You can’t be serious! You saved her family, you saved her, all because you know how horrible Black Doom would be to them. How he’d use them!”

Shadow bit his lip and clenched his fist. “Then I made a mistake, clearly.”

Silver’s eyes widened. “How can you say such a thing?” he yelled, hurling a fist at him.

Shadow responded with a firm kick to the head and landed. “Because it’s true.”

Sonic looked to his left. There lay the stone, wrapped in a sheet of stiff paper. He picked it up and read the note before gritting his teeth and running forward. “No, it’s not!”

Shadow held his hand up at Luneria, who also had him in her sights. “Time to end your little adventure, Bastette.”

“By all means, whoever shoots faster wins.”

Sonic jumped in front of him and held the stone out. “Seven chimes—“

And then, a flash. A break in Shadow’s focus. Sonic landed and skidded to a stop before turning to face Shadow. His eyes were dulled out and able to see whatever memory Shadow had been ensnared in. “She told you before, right? Do you remember what she said?” the blue blur asked him.

Shadow’s quills lowered, and the dark aura around him began to disappear. The red on his quills slowly returned, and he dropped to his knees. “That… that even if people are selfish, even if they hurt each other, they’re trying to be good…” he muttered.

Knuckles walked over and folded Shadow’s hands, placing the fixed crystal in his open palm. Then he folded his fingers around it and stepped back.

Silver quickly recovered and bit down on his lip, straining until a flood of psychic power came through. He threw up a shield as another lance came falling.

Sonic nodded as Shadow felt a tear slide down his cheek. “You remember, then. But what about now?”

Shadow snapped awake, and looked down in his hands. He felt the familiar warmth of the crystal in his hand. “Rouge?” he asked. “I…” He stood up and wiped his tears away before staring up towards the aggressor. “I know you don’t want to listen. You just want to be upset.”

“But you’re hurting the people you care about right here, and right now,” Sonic said turning to face her. “Including your sister.”

Silver backed up with the shield and met the two of them. “If you feed the fears of the future, you’ll starve the people of today. You’ll hurt yourself that way, too.”

“I…” Luneria said, clutching her head. “I…” She shrieked as Bastette came back to reality. “I didn’t mean to hurt anybody! I was so afraid that… that…” Her eyes welled up as she dropped to her knees upon reaching the ground.

Silver relaxed and walked forward, arms outstretched to hug, when the frown suddenly upturned and she shot him another glare. He leapt back and threw his arms up. “Stay back and—“

Knuckles leapt out of the way in time, but as his eyes focused on the three hedgehogs, he realized they weren’t actually there- it was now just the crystal statues they’d become that the echidna saw. He breathed out a ragged “No.”

Luneria smiled. “Your pleas served me well, Bastette. Now, where was I?” Her eyes swiveled to the frozen trio as she stood. “Ah yes, the executioner's block.”

She pulled one of her lances out from the floor and circled the boys. “Eeny, meeny, miney, munder- which hedgehog to smash asunder?” she asked.

She stopped at Silver. “Ew, I don’t even know you,” she said, raising the weapon. “Best to kill the one without consequence first.”

Knuckles watched Nyx stumbled half asleep towards Luneria. “Are you crazy…” he muttered before running the opposite direction and shouting. “Hey, you want something to smash? Bet you can’t break me.”

“The Guardian?” she thought to herself. “Without him, that pesky nuisance won’t be able to come back.” She sighed, weighing her options after a few seconds. “Hogs first, him later. I want the stone in there.” Her eyes fixed on the Sapphire trapped deep within the mass of crystals. 

She pulled the weapon up and held it with both hands. “Then I can take your souls, too…” she muttered.

As she brought down her weapon, there was a shrill squeal. A figure glowing in gold jumped within the blow radius and forced the crystal weapon off of her. She held her hand up and scowled as she floated there. A symbol- an eye- glowed bright on her head.

“I won’t let you hurt my friends,” Nyx said.

“So it _is_ you. What are you doing now? Get out of my way!” Luneria said. She struck again, but Nyx stayed were she was and the blow only made a golden ripple on an otherwise invisible shield. “You’re ruining everything!”

“You have that honor, and you know it,” Nyx said. “You should never have come here.”

“I always come here,” Luneria said. “It’s the best place to feed. Why did you stop feeding?”

“Because I intend to live with these people, not consume them!” Nyx cried. “And that’s why I have to stop you and any other member of my family you persuade. I have to do what I must to protect my _real_ family.”

“Poor poor misguided Nyx,” Luneria said. “How long are you going to be like this? You’ve hurt countless people in eons past. What makes this any different? You think you’re a better moth just because you had a heart?” She struck again. “You really are a stupid child.”

“I’m no more stupid than you, Aria,” she said. “Why don’t you use your epithet and be a bigger person.”

Luneria struck the shield, shattering it as she pulled away. “Now you’re mine!”

As Nyx recoiled from the swing, Luneria stopped mid-air. “What…. what is…” the entity asked. “Bastette, stop… don’t do…”

She clutched her face and fell to the floor, locked in a fight with herself. “Bastette, don’t do this, I…”


	15. Jolted Awake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Bastette begins to break free, she learns what happened the night her world first came crashing down.

Sonic, Shadow, and Silver all took a deep breath in as they entered the blank world of Bastette’s mental island. Sonic held the Sapphire in his hands along with the picture, and Shadow walked forward a bit and looked around.

“Okay, um…” Silver said. “What is this place?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Sonic said. 

“It’s her dreamscape, I’ve been to this before,” Shadow said. “Well, not this one, but it looks pretty similar.”

City walls closed around them like dominoes in reverse, and Silver shot up and looked around. A quiet hum came from around the city streets, and it enveloped the three of them. Yet none of them felt any different.

Shadow turned a corner and found Bastette sitting in a crumbled building and crying, holding Briar in her arms. “She’s asleep,” Bastette said. 

“Bastette, I—“ Shadow began.

“I know, you’re sorry,” she said. She dropped the child, who faded away into nothing but smoke. “I really thought that if you felt my pain even a little that you’d understand how hard it was to let go.”

“Of course I understood your pain,” the black hedgehog said as the others joined him. “I lost my best friend, practically my sister. I never physically changed but she watched me grow up in a sense. And I would have died in her place if I had been given the option.”

Silver walked forward. “Bastette, you have to let it go.”

“How can I let go of so many fears?” she asked. “I just want everything to go right.”

“Things don’t go right, danger’s just how we roll,” Sonic said. “‘Tette, you explore dangerous places all the time. Don’t you think your sister worries about you, too?”

Bastette nodded and clutched her arms, holding herself.

“And yet she knows you’ll come back,” Shadow said. 

Sonic opened the paper, where a picture of two men standing behind their daughter in a family photo stood in black-and-white. There was text scribbled and an arrow pointed to the girl in blue pen. “Is this…?”

He looked at the stone and nodded, walking forward. 

Bastette, despite facing away, hunched over as she recoiled.

“Don’t be afraid, I’m just here to give you something,” the blue hedgehog said. He walked next to her and sat down. “I’d offer you a tissue but I don’t think I have one with me.”

Tears ran down her cheeks. “I’m sorry I hurt you,” she said. “I didn’t wanna scratch you, but I did it anyway.”

“Hey, it’ll heal over,” Sonic replied. “Just like how you’ll heal one day, too.” He looked into the outcropping of the crumbled building. 

“But… in the wreckage…” she said. “They never found my brother.”

The other two approached. Silver put a hand on her shoulder. 

Shadow nodded, looking at the photo. “Maybe that’s because she never died.”

 _“She?”_ Bastette asked.

Sonic held out the photo to her. “She never died,” he repeated.

As she gingerly took the photo, she traced the edge of the girl’s face. “That’s…” She stopped and read the text beside the photo. “Seven chimes?”

The stone in Sonic’s hand began to glow. He smiled, and looked at the cat. “I think you need the truth.”

Bastette looked down at the photo. “I… but how?”

The world grew dark, and the sounds of panic surrounded the four of them. Bastette stood up quickly and began to run, but Shadow grabbed her and locked his arms around her. She was shaking and staring at the chaos around them all.

Shadow awkwardly hugged a bit tighter. “Painful memories are always the most frightening.” He watched as the past him came tearing through the city streets and over to the building. “Look.”

The four of them watched as the past Shadow held up a part of the collapsing building, shouting in relative silence as two figures emerged from within- Bastette and Briar. The past Shadow called out to the two, telling them to get away before the building came down on them, and they ran off into the distance.

The past Shadow looked back into the wreckage, and the four figures of the present day slowly came closer. “Is that…” Silver asked.

Within the building, two pairs of feet stuck out from under the rubble, toes pointed down, and a third figure was trapped beneath a fallen pillar. A young cat, around the same age as Bastette, was shouting out to the hedgehog.

“Leave me,” he said. “I'm in too much trouble. You’ll be better off letting me go.”

The past Shadow just stared at him, lost in thought as to what to do. His eyes searched the ground.

“There are plenty of other people you need to save, hedgehog,” the cat said. “Do yourself a favor and _give them a chance_.”

The past Shadow looked back to him, eyes wide as the phrase registered. “No,” he said. He pulled out a Chaos Emerald and leapt forward as the building collapsed. “Chaos…”

The vision faded, and the world went back to the white dreamscape.

“Wow,” Shadow said, clutching his head. “I… I thought that was a fever dream.”

“You…” Bastette covered both of her hands with her face. “He’s still alive… and…” She paused and looked down at the page. Her tears dropped onto the photo. “She’s so beautiful.”

* * *

The Opal clattered to the ground. Knuckles ran over to grab it, but Nyx stopped him, holding her arms out.

“Don’t,” she said. She turned around and breathed out. “Seven chimes.” An aura of gold enveloped the gem, and she carefully held the contained Opal on her palm. “If you touch it, you’ll end up like she did. Luneria Aria is a being of who feeds on anguish, and if she can’t find any, she will make it herself.”

“What are you talking about?” Knuckles said. He could feel the world shake around him as the platform lowered to the ground.

“I’m meant to watch over the seven Eyes because I did this to them, Knuckles. I did it to ensure they never got their hands on the sacred power you watch over.” Nyx looked away. 

“The Master Emerald? What would they want with that?”

“Everything, Knuckles,” she said. “Everything. Maybe I can show you later, but for now…” She pointed to the trio, who’d been unpetrified.

Knuckles ran over and smiled. “Sonic!” he yelled.

“It’s good to be back,” he said. He looked down, noticing that he still held the Sapphire and the photo it was wrapped in. “I guess you _can_ bring things with you.”

Silver ran over to Nyx and carefully gave her a hug, trying not to bump the Opal she was holding. “Nyx, we did it! We finally stopped Luneria.”

“Well…” Nyx said quietly.

“Well what?” Silver asked. “Aren’t you happy?”

“Of course I’m happy!” Nyx said. “It’s just… nevermind, I’ll tell you later.”

“Okay…” he said.

Shadow’s eyes flickered open, and he realized that he was holding Rouge in his arms. Startled, he dropped her and frowned. “I…”

Rouge groaned. “Did you seriously just drop me?” she asked.

“It’s nothing, Rouge,” Shadow replied, trying to hide his embarrassment.

Rouge gave him a hug. “Well, I’m back now. Miss me?”

Shadow scoffed, but gently patted her back. “Miss you? I was getting used to not hearing you complain!”

“Oh shut up,” she said, lightly smacking his shoulder. She caught Bastette, who was standing alone and holding herself close as she breathed heavily. Her eyes were fixed on something past them both. “Hey, what’s she looking at?”

As Rouge’s eyes lay upon Sylphic, she gasped. 

Shadow looked down. “He’s gone, Rouge.”

Bastette stood up and ran over to him. “Sylphic?” she yelled. “Sylphic, I… I didn’t want to… I…” Her crying got worse and she shook more than a leaf in a summer storm.

Sonic rushed over and held her. “Hey,” he said softly. “Easy.”

She reached for the photo in his hand. “He died trying to get this to me,” she said. “Didn’t he?”

Sonic reached down. “Something isn’t right about this,” he said.

“You’ve never seen a corpse before have you?” Bastette said. 

“No,” Sonic replied. “But that’s not even what I meant.” He watched as Bastette hugged the photo. “Was he always that... blue?”

“Bolt is alive…” she whispered.

“Wait a second,” Sonic said, spotting more blue ink. “What’s this?”

He gingerly pulled the photo for a second as he’d spied ink along the back. It read “Shadow, just in case- page 37”.

“Shadz, you got mail,” Sonic called.

“Don’t call me that!” he shouted. The black hedgehog skated over. “What are you talking about?” He grimaced as he approached Sylphic’s limp figure.

“The photo said to look on page 37. Any idea what that means?” Sonic asked. He held up the page.

Shadow’s eyes widened, and he quickly knelt down and turned the hybrid over before unbuckling the small notebook he kept on his belt. “Did he leave me a note about the cure, maybe?” he asked. “But how would we even administer such a thing?”

“Beats me, but it must be important if he addressed it to you,” he said. “I wish I got mail. Well, I do... but it’s all from Amy…”

Shadow found the page, and as he opened it, a single quill fell to the ground- a lavender quill, tipped with a light blue. On the page were a series of scrawlings, but one thing stuck out among them: “Half-Chao”.

Sonic stepped back a bit. “Whoa, uh, Shadow?” he pointed towards Sylphic. “Might wanna take a look at this.”

Shadow’s eyes peeked over the page, and he furrowed. The hybrid’s body had become lavender again, and the hole in his chest was closing up. Stranger still, he was trying to prop himself up.

Shadow threw the notebook aside and yanked him up by the arm. The lavender spines Sylphic beared had a gradient into blue at the tips, and they hung longer than they had before. “How, how is that even possible?” Shadow asked. “You took a spike to the chest.”

Sylphic smiled, still half groggy and definitely exhausted. He grabbed the quill from Shadow’s hand. “Because I’m _half_ Chao, not one third. Two of the vials were still full of blood.”

“That still doesn’t explain how you—“

“Chao aren’t immortal, except under the right conditions,” Sylphic said. “I guess my boxes were ticked.”

“Wait,” Knuckles asked. “Does that mean…?”

“Yep,” Sylphic said. “I’m here to stay. Well, maybe in a week or two… I’m bushed for adventures.”

He groaned as Bastette tackled him. “Whoa, hey now, birthday girl. Take it easy!”

“I’m just… I thought I killed you,” she said.

“Me? Killed? You must have me confused for some other lab experiment,” he said. 

Bastette looked around. “But… where’s Briar?”

“Hey, we found her!” Silver shouted from afar. The psychic floated the little cat over as he returned to the group. “She’s okay, though she took a tumble.”

Bastette’s eyes downturned for a moment, but Sylphic propped her chin up. “Hey,” he said. “I have one last surprise for you, and it’s the biggest one yet.”

Her ears perked. “And what is that?” she asked.

* * *

“Aaaand, done,” Sylphic said, pulling the needle out of Shadow’s arm. “Blood donation complete.”

The black hedgehog shuddered and held his arm. “Are you sure this will stave off her illness?”

“Worked with Maria,” Sylphic said. “Since she was O-, Gerald had to have a suitable donor with a compatible blood type. Since O- blood was the only option for her, it would have made sense to create you with a compatible blood type. Fortunately for Briar, O- blood is a universal donor.”

“Oh,” Shadow said, frowning. “Lucky me…”

“Hey, don’t be so moody, you’re saving a life,” Sylphic said. “I’m not asking you to come here more than once a month. I can take four weeks worth in a session and it’ll be enough.”

“I know, it’s just…” Shadow sighed. 

“Listen, I know you still feel bad by implying that she was immature and putting Rouge in danger. But the truth of the matter is that people say and do things they don’t intend to be destructive to cope with pain and anger. That includes Bastette hurting you, and that includes you hurting her.” Sylphic said. “You’re getting awfully bent out of shape over her. Are you sure you don’t have feelings? Not that I mind or anything.”

Shadow bristled. “You know I’m not interested in that sort of thing!” he said. “Besides, the date today is just so she can reconnect with—“

“I know, I know. I’m just teasing,” Syll said. “Besides, you were in worse shape over a different girl, from what your blue friend told me.”

Shadow swallowed hard. “I don’t know what you’re on about. So stop teasing me.”

The medic snickered and reached down into a nearby minifridge that he kept in the room. “Here, I got these for us.” He tossed a can to Shadow and popped open the tab on the second one. “Sorry about the branding, their company had a merger with some stupid big-name group in 1989, apparently.”

Shadow looked down at the can. “Strawberry Lemonade?” he asked. “Isn’t this…”

“Yep. Tastes the same, too.”

Shadow carefully opened the tab and took a sip. “You’re right…” he said.

“Hey, Shadow?” the medic said.

“Yeah?”

“Happy monthaversary.”

Shadow cracked a smile. “Yeah… happy monthaversary to you, too.” He held his drink up for a moment and went to take another sip.

A car honked from outside, and the two of them turned to face the window. Sylphic looked out and stared down into the street, spying a familiar cat in a black car. “Ope, looks like your chariot’s here,” he said. “Best not keep them waiting.”

“Agreed,” the hedgehog replied. He went to down his lemonade, but stopped for a second, opting instead to savor it as long as possible. “Do you mind if I take this with me?”

“Not at all.”

Shadow nodded and grabbed the door handle. “Tell me how the first donation goes, okay? I have an assignment around when she’d be getting it so I can’t come in.”

“Ten four,” Sylphic said, turning towards the counter. “Stay safe out there.”

“Or what, you’ll kill me?” Shadow asked.

“Or I’ll take extra blood,” the hybrid replied.

Shadow shuddered as he shut the door. Getting blood drawn was a fate worse than death. He made his way out of the adapted apartment and down into the foyer via elevator, politely sipping his drink as he went. And as he exited onto the street, a smiling cat was greeting him. “Hey, Shadow! You ready to go?”

“I still don’t know why you invited me of all people,” Shadow said. “You could have chosen anybody else.”

“Tails was busy with something, and Syll’s preparing the transfusion.”

“What about Rouge, isn’t she free?” Shadow asked, pulling open the car door. He clambered inside. Two agents sat waiting for him, their stoic faces unmoving and statue-like. 

“I don’t know what Rouge is doing but she says she’s too busy as well,” Bastette said. She propped herself more upright in the seat. “These things are not built for cats like me…”

Shadow closed the door and pulled down his belt. “Or hedgehogs, for that matter.”

She shot him a smirk. “I also wanted you here because I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” she said.

Shadow paused, but then slowly buckled his belt. “Okay then. Shoot.”

Bastette sat back a little. “Why did you do it?”

“Huh? Did what?”

“Why did you save her?” she asked. “I mean, she asked you to focus on someone else. I thought you were down with the whole “honoring dead people’s wishes” thing.”

“Well,” he replied. “I was honoring a wish.”

“Oh? And how is that?”

“Well, during most of the Black Arms incident, my memory was screwed up. Partially because I still had many things to work on, and partially because I was…” he paused, trying to pinpoint the most appropriate term. “I guess ‘brainwashed’ is the best way to put it. My heritage as a Black Arms hybrid meant that I was susceptible to Black Doom’s manipulations. And up until that day I’d been obedient to a fault.”

“What about that day made you change your mind?” 

“That your sister asked me to “give them a chance”. Despite her opportunity to be selfish, she still wanted to give up her life to save another.” Shadow rubbed the spot between his thumb and forefinger with his other thumb. “The reason I saved her was because it was people like her who could help make the world a little less cruel. And that’s what Maria would have wanted.”

Bastette nodded. “So, were you surprised to learn that my sister is—“

“Trans? No, not by any means. Honestly, I was more surprised with you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Preconceived notions that weren’t healthy. Things about how people should or shouldn’t look.” Shadow sighed. “I’m just glad that you were okay after you came back from whatever that was. Is the... dysphoria is the term, right? Is it still bad?”

“No, not particularly. What Luneria did to me was definitely frightening and very _very_ painful, but that’s not how surgery works in real life and I’m definitely glad I get to choose how I look on _my_ terms this time.” She looked out the window. “Oh, there they are!”

Out the window was Captain Briggs, sitting at a café with a peach-colored cat in a wheelchair. A sky-blue quilt covered her legs. She was sipping a mug of tea when Bastette called out to her. “Hey, Jolt! It’s me!”

As Jolt turned, her face lit up. “Hey, looks like the Thunder finally rolled in.”

Bastette leapt our of the car and ran up to her sister. “Hey, you know I don’t go by that name anymore, that’s a family secret!” she teased, giving her a big hug.

“I’m sorry, sis, I just couldn’t resist the pun. You’ll forgive me, right?” Jolt asked. 

“Yeah, _after_ I slug you one for being so brazen,” Bastette said, giving her sister a playful punch to the shoulder.

“Hey, I’ll take it over getting hit with your noggin any day.” Jolt watched as Shadow carefully clambered out of the car. “Where’s little Rai-rai?” she asked.

“Briar? Oh, she’s playing with her friend Cream. They have a tea party every week, it’s kinda their thing.” She waved Shadow over. “Come on, I want you to meet my sis!” she called.

Briggs stood up. “They called our order, gotta get it. I’ll be back, pumpkin,” he said, scratching his daughter’s head. 

“Dad, you know how uncool that is,” Jolt whined as her father left. “Especially in front of guests.”

Shadow walked forward. “So, you’re Jolt, huh?” he asked. “Twin sister?”

“Yep! The oldest cat in the family!” she said with pride. “And the fastest, too.”

Bastette chuckled. “You’re in a wheelchair!” she said. “And you’re like, _twelve_ minutes older, maybe.”

Jolt grinned. “Hey, just because it looks like I can’t walk, doesn’t mean I can’t get around.” She pulled the quilt away, revealing a set of chrome legs that seemed to extend up and under her floral skirt. “Dad doesn’t have to push me anymore in this wheelchair either- I can do it all by myself with my talents.”

Bastette smirked. “I’ll bet.”

“Those look… incredibly expensive,” Shadow said. 

“They would be if they had any actual means of propping me upright. I’m afraid they’re just for show,” she said. “Bastette, you said you had something to show me when you reached out yesterday?”

“Oh, right!” the orange cat said, fishing around in her bag. “Alright, lip balm, tazer, steel file… geez, what did I buy that got me a receipt that long?” 

Shadow raised an eyebrow to Jolt. “So you say you’re fast, huh?”

“Well, once I get these babies up and running I’m gonna be putting the pedal to the metal,” Jolt said, gesturing to her chrome legs. ”I can’t stay in the wheelchair forever, you know.”

“You sound an awful lot like someone else I know,” the hedgehog said. “Heck, you have big talk like him too.”

“I take it you two get competitive pretty often,” Jolt said to him. “And you’re allowed to have big talk if you have something to be proud of.”

“Oh, and what’s that?” Shadow asked, raising an eyebrow.

Jolt rubbed her hands together. “Oh ho ho, I was just waiting for you to say something.” She held her hand up. “Gimme a high five.”

“What?” Shadow said. “I don’t really…”

“Come on, it’s just a high five.”

“Bastette,” Shadow said. “What’s happening?”

“It’s just a high five, Shadow,” she said, still looking through her bag. “It’s no big deal.”

Shadow awkwardly put his hand up and clapped it to Jolt’s, and immediately his body sparked up. His muscles tensed for a second before he fell over onto the ground. Slowly he reached for the edge of the table. “Okay, what was that?”

Bastette giggled. “Well, she’s called Jolt for a reason, Shadow. I mean you have your name, Sonic has his…”

“And I have mine!” Jolt said, puffing our her chest with pride. "Strongest shock around town."

Shadow pulled himself off the ground and shook his head. “That packs… _quite_ a punch. Bastette, why didn’t you stop me?”

Bastette was trying to hold back her laughter. “Because maybe… _just maybe_ … I was in on it.”

Shadow frowned. 

“Oh, don’t gimme that. Hey look, the food’s here.”

As Briggs sat down, Bastette pulled the card out of her bag. “Here, Mr. Briggs,” she said. 

“You can call me Devon, it’s okay,” he said, taking the card. “Wow, so you say she’s really _that_ talented?”

Shadow quietly sipped the remainder of his lemonade and eyed the pizza in front of them. Food was definitely on his mind since he’d gotten blood drawn and this was the perfect way to end the day.

“She’s worked with us for a while now,” Bastette said. “Since she helped with Briar’s leg braces, I figured that she could help you, too.”

Shadow abruptly sucked his drink down the wrong pipe and started coughing. Bastette frowned and patted him on the back until his throat was clear. “Drank too fast?” she asked.

Shadow paused for a moment. “Y-yeah,” he said. He looked over at the business card, which held a familiar T-symbol on the back along with the name “Prower”.

As the conversation continued, Shadow took a slice of pizza and smiled. _Heh, you learn something new everyday._


	16. A Hopeful Octave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the adventure winds down, Knuckles and Bastette learn the unfortunate truth about the Eyes of Luneria and the reason Nyx is supposed to watch over them before Silver is sent home. Rouge helps gather the rest of the pieces, and Akshi finally decides to break the ice with Knuckles.

“So you could have told us before?” Knuckles asked.

It had been another day, and the pool was finally ready to take Silver home. Nyx nervously played with her fingers as she tried to find an elegant way to explain herself. Knuckles and Bastette were tagging along through the valley, the latter out of curiosity, and the former out of a promise.

“I _could_ have, but Aria would have figured out and evaded you,” she said. “Any change in the visions might have shifted the odds in her favor.”

“But I thought her name was Luneria,” Bastette said. “Who is this Aria?”

“Aria is an epithet, Luneria is the name given to all of the Eyes,” she said. She pulled her sarong from her waist and slung it over her shoulders. Today was colder than usual. “And so I address her by her epithet to specify.”

She passed under the waterfall, and though there was a pause from the other three, they eventually followed suit and followed her down into the cavern beyond. Knuckles passed under first, then Silver held the water up for himself and Bastette, but as soon as they had cleared it, they frowned as Knuckles shook himself dry.

“But aren’t they just rocks?” Silver said, wiping the residual splash from his body. “What’s with calling it a ‘her’?”

“Maybe to you, but just as your friends were turned to stone, so were they.” Nyx trudged along. “They have names, they have personalities, they have pronouns, just like us.”

“So they’re living people?” Knuckles said. “How is that possible?”

Nyx stopped for a moment. “It’s… a long story.”

“Well, there’s still time, isn’t there?” Silver asked.

“Very well,” Nyx said.

As they entered the chamber, the pool of water glowed contently as though it were greeting Silver. The plants in the water bobbed along and the teal glow beneath from the matter of mushrooms dotted all about the cave around them swirled like a tempest. There was a full warmth from the pool, too- it was ready, indeed.

“Long ago, thousands of years back, there was an ancient tribe of moths like me. They were often at odds by a tribe of birds called the “Angel Clan”, fighting over every little thing they could imagine.” A gold glow from her began to light the cavern walls. “Their spiritual leaders were eight birds of great strength, will, and mystical talent. They lived on an island in the sky, a place that the moth clan wanted for their own.”

“An island in the sky? That sounds like…” Knuckles thought to himself.

Nyx nodded. “Eight moth sisters were born with incredible abilities capable of killing the eight birds and devouring their souls. When one of them, Aria, got ambitious, she crystallized one of the eight, shattered them, and allowed them to be reshaped into a blue stone.” She reached into her pockets and grabbed the Sapphire she’d been given. “She fed that bird’s soul to her sister as a proof of concept, and that sister later became this gem here. The rest of the bird- the blue stone itself and the powers that he had, I mean- were all that remained separate.”

As they entered the chamber, Nyx pulled the Opal out, which was wrapped in a thick handkerchief. She walked up to the mural and carefully placed the two eyes in the two holes in the face.

“So that’s it then?” Knuckles said. “Mission accomplished?”

“Unfortunately, no,” Nyx said. She pointed to five holes that made up the figure’s crown. “Those are also Eyes.”

“But there are Eight sisters, right?” Bastette said, walking forward. “I only see seven holes here.”

“Is that what you were afraid to tell me earlier?” Silver asked. “Why you had that strange glowing eye on your forehead?”

Nyx sighed. “I suppose I better not hide anymore.” Her aura glowed a bit brighter, and the symbol came back into view. “You meant this, right?” she asked, pointing to her face.

“Yeah, that,” Silver said. “What’s up with that?”

“It’s the Eighth Eye,” Nyx admitted. 

Knuckles tensed up. “D-do we need to get it out of you or something?” he asked, walking towards her.

Nyx held up her hand. “No, no. It’s fine. I should be more clear- _I’m_ the Eighth Eye. The deceptive one, the traitor, Luneria Nyx.” The little girl began to cry. “The Turncoat Eye.”

“Nyx, I…” Bastette knelt down. “Don’t cry, you’re better than that. You haven’t betrayed us or anything.”

“How have you lived for this long?” Knuckles asked. His hands brushed against the stone carvings. “That would have had to have been thousands of years ago. How did you survive this long?”

“I haven’t,” Nyx said. “When the last Nyx died, the stone at the bottom of the well- the true Nyx- chose another vessel.”

“That makes sense,” Bastette said. “The people here usually leave their eggs in the well because they believe it provides blessings. So she’s a spirit in a vessel.”

Knuckles pursed his lips. “Well, why’d you do it? Why’d you help your sisters kill the eight birds of Angel Island?”

Nyx shook her head. “I didn’t kill any of them. In fact, I only managed to spare one of them before I turned on my sisters. That’s why I’m considered a traitor.” She looked away. “That’s why my community spurns me- I am considered a god-killer in their eyes.”

“Then why would you turn on them?” Knuckles asked. “Having power handed to you would have tempted anyone.”

“One of them rescued me from the very well where my gem sleeps now,” she replied. “I’d sneak out of the village and he’d sneak out of his and we’d talk like our people weren’t fighting each other. He was kind to me, nothing like how my older sisters described. And I kinda liked him a little, too. We were friends for a long time, but when my older sisters decided to humiliate their youngest by demanding she kill her friend, the leader of the Eight Angels, she- _I-_ refused.” She sniffled and curled herself up.

Silver held her close. “Easy, Nyx…”

“I… I didn’t want him to die, and I didn’t want the others to die, but Aria rallied them all against me.” Her voice was becoming more intense. ”She shattered him and gave me one last chance to reconsider, and the _only_ thing I considered was leaving them to the same fate they left my friend!” she shouted. “That’s what they deserved.”

Her gold aura enveloped the room, and Bastette swallowed hard as she felt a wave of sadness hit her. “Nyx, your powers…” she said.

The moth stood up and sighed, retracting her glow. “I’m… I’m sorry… I miss him so much, and no matter how much I want to see him, I’m too afraid to go to his resting place. I… I don’t know what he’d think of me.”

“Well, maybe we can bring him to you,” Knuckles said. “Where is he?”

Nyx chuckled and looked directly at him. “You know exactly where he is. Or at least where he should be.”

Knuckles’ eyes widened. “Wait, you mean… that… it’s a person?” he stuttered.

“More or less, yeah,” Nyx said. “The Master Emerald is only one whose soul was never taken.”

“Is that why it talks?” Knuckles said. “Why is everything making more sense _and_ less sense at the same time?” he asked, visibly shaking. “C-Can he see me?”

Bastette put a hand on the echidna’s shoulder. “Relax, kid, you’re thinking of way too much at once.”

“I’m just tryna decide how paranoid I should be,” Knuckles said.

Nyx grinned. “I mean he’s probably known you since you became the Guardian, so if he hasn’t been informal to you to this point, then he has some standard of professionalism.”

“Still, it’s really weird to think about it like that,” Knuckles said. “Maybe there’s a stone that’ll wipe my memory or—“

“Relax!” the other three shouted. Bastette walked over and held Knuckles as he continued to process what he’d heard.

Silver smiled. “Nyx, are you ready to go?”

She kicked off her sandals and jumped into the pool. “Yep, all set.”

As the pool began to glow a deep red, she called out. “Seven lights of the Earth, I, Luneria Nyx, call upon your strength to return this wayward soul to his realm.”

Silver frowned as he stepped into the water. There was something weird about tromping into a pool in knee-high boots but he wasn’t willing to say anything. He carefully joined Nyx. “How could you not swim before?”

“There’s a rock here,” she flatly replied. “I can touch.”

“Oh.” Silver frowned. “So um, how exactly does this work?” 

“Lean back, exhale, let yourself sink to the bottom,” she said. “Super simple.”

“But what if I need to breathe before I hit the bottom?” 

“Oh, don’t worry, you won’t have the need.”

Silver leaned back and breathed in, and then out. “Inner peace,” Silver said.

Nyx rolled her eyes and pushed the hedgehog down just a little at his next breath out.

Silver felt the warm water around him as he drifted downwards slowly. He wanted badly to breath in, but even as he tried, he realized he physically couldn’t. But while he panicked, he approached the floor of the pool and the water got hotter and hotter.

And then the light and heat went white.

* * *

Silver slammed into the floor of the Professor’s lab. “Ugh…” he groaned. “Well, that was an adventure…”

“Schilver!” the Professor said, grabbing the hedgehog a little too tight and squeezing him in a bear hug. “Ve’ve missed you!”

“We’ve?” Silver asked. 

The Bits chirped on Von Schlemmer’s shoulders. “ _010101110110010101101100011000110110111101101101011001010010000001101000011011110110110101100101_!” they said in unison.

“Oh,” Silver said. “Hey, you three. Still as cute as ever.”

“And I’m here too,” a voice called from behind.

The Professor let him down and he turned. There was Gold, safe and sound, standing in the doorway with a backlight from the street upstairs. “You’ll have to fill me in.”

“Gold!” Silver said, tackling her. “S-sorry, I… I missed you so much!”

“I know you did, silly, that’s why you tackled me,” she replied. “I know how excitable you are.”

“Heh, yeah,” Silver said sheepishly. “Um… Gold? There’s been something I’ve been scared to ask you for a long time.”

Gold smiled. “I know.”

“Y-you do?” Silver asked, standing up and helping her get to her feet.

“Well, you’re not exactly good at hiding it,” she said. 

“Well then, what do you think?” he asked, a little more confident.

“I think we need more time to be friends, but I’m liking what I’ve seen so far,” she said. “We’ll see how the future goes.”

“Okay.” Silver grinned. “Uh, do you wanna go on a date? Like, a friend-date? Geez, I really _am_ terrible at hiding it, aren’t I?”

Gold smiled. “It’s okay. Yeah, let’s go get some food. I’m starving.”

* * *

Sonic rushed up to Tails’ door. “Buddy?”

Tails responded. “Yeah?”

“What plans do you have Saturday?” he asked. 

“I’m going into town for some TLC with Amy, and then I’m heading to a sleepover with her and ‘Tette,” she said. “There’s a new friend she wants me to meet.”

“Okay, just checking,” Sonic said. His voice was a little disappointed.

Tails came into the other room. “Okay, what’s up?” she said, hands on her hips. She was wearing a white collared shirt with a pair of overalls. “You’re acting very weird. What’s got your goat?”

“Me? Nothing! It’s just…” Sonic slumped over. “You’ve been hangin’ around Amy a lot these past two days.”

“Yeah, it’s called being a friend. You and I hang out all the time, and this isn’t any different.”

“But… Amy is… you know…” Sonic was floundering for words.

Tails raised an eyebrow. “A girl?” she said.

Sonic blushed, embarrassed by his difficulty in clarifying. “N-no, that’s not what I meant to—“

“Sonic, I know that you’ve missed me for the _singular_ day that I was turned to stone but… I saw something when I was in that other dimension that I need to figure out. Please understand.”

Sonic nodded. “Whatever it is, I’ll support you, okay pal? Just don’t hide things from me, okay?”

Tails bit her tongue and fought the words she was afraid yet yearning to say. “Okay.”

Sonic began to walk away.

“Wait, Sonic, I—“ she blurted.

“Yeah?” He turned around. “You forget something?”

Tails breathed out. “Nevermind, I got it,” she said with a smile, though the corners of her lips nervously twitched downwards. “Just be careful, it’s gonna rain soon. The last thing you want is to hydroplane.”

* * *

“Here’s the last one,” Rouge said, handing the last piece of the Emerald. “You’re lucky I didn’t just run off with them.”

“You’re being surprisingly generous today,” Knuckles said, carefully restoring the gem. “Are you trying to get something out of me?”

“I’m afraid not this time,” she said. “Though I’m not gonna go any easier on you.” She began walking away, one foot in front of the other. For a moment, she traced the triangular cut in her ear.

“Where are you going?” the echidna barked.

“Just giving you some time to chat it up. I can’t be the third wheel to you two.”

Knuckles frowned in embarrassment. “You little bat girl, I oughta…”

“Hey now, no need to threaten a lady with that kind of talk.” She turned around. “Oh, and tell him thank you for me, if you can. A bowl of grapes would be nice.”

Knuckles scoffed as she took off.

 _“Wow, nice going, Romeo. You’re really quite the lady killer aren’t ya?”_ the voice from the Emerald snickered at him.

Knuckles froze up. “W-well, you’re suddenly less formal,” he nervously replied.

_“Well, I figured that you probably already knew, so why act anymore?”_

Knuckles sighed and sat down. “So you’ve been trapped in there for thousands of years and you never had the decency to tell me?” he said. 

_“It wasn’t relevant before, never had a threat like any of the Eyes before a few days ago.”_

“Yeah, well, I guess now it’s less weird that I’m talking to a rock, right?” Knuckles said. 

_“Mmm, no, it’s still weird.”_

“You know you’re an awfully mouthy rock, aren’t you?”

_“And you’re a lousy Guardian, what’s your point?”_

“I swear if I could see you face to face I’d kick the crap outta you,” Knuckles replied.

_“That can be arranged.”_

Knuckles stopped. “How? I can’t exactly—“

_“We’re connected, so... yeah- you can.”_

Knuckles flopped over and shut his eyes.

_“Uh… what are you doing?”_

“Relax, I’m just laying down,” he said. “I assume that’s how I can reach you. Don’t really know any other way.”

_“You’re a bad Guardian but at least you’re smarter than you look.”_

Knuckles was already halfway asleep. “Shuddup, I gotta focus.” He took in a a deep breath, feeling as the cold of the stone under him soaked into his fur, and then out. The rush of air cleared the negativity from his body. In came the good, out went the bad.

On his fifth inhale, his eyes snapped awake, and he was alone on the island. It was still night, and he was still laying at the top of the shrine. But as he turned, he saw that the Emerald was gone. “Oh no, the—“

“Relax,” the familiar voice said. 

Knuckles turned around and jumped at the sight of a tall bird staring back at him. He was leaning on a stone wall and grinning, and his heavy black boots clonked as he stood up straight. 

“Are you…” Knuckles breathed.

“Yep,” the bird replied. “You can keep calling me what you’ve been calling me, but when you’re here, it’s nice to be less formal.”

“Then what should I call you?” he asked, his posture still on the defensive.

“Akshi,” he replied holding out his hand. “The little cat made it up for me and I like it.”

Knuckles lowered his guard and shook his hand. “Akshi, huh? And... what do you do here, exactly?”

“Well, I was hoping you could help me catch up with what I’ve missed. It’s been pretty boring and I’ve heard there are things in your world that blow that ancient tech out of the water,” Akshi chuckled. “I bet that makes me sound old.”

“Well yeah, but that’s not your fault,” Knuckles said. “How exactly would I show you any of this stuff?”

“Well, how do you get stuff in a dream?” he asked. 

“You just kinda… think about it I guess?” Knuckles said. “I've never really been aware I’m in a dream before now.” He looked down at his hands and clenched his eyes shut. 

“No no, just _feel_ what you want to be there. Don’t think of the details until you feel the weight of it in your hands,” Akshi said.

Knuckles nodded. “Okay, 3… 2….” He felt the weight of a bowl in his hands.

A bowl of red grapes.

Akshi smirked as he popped one into his mouth. “Looks like the bat can _really_ get to you.”

Knuckles softly punched him in the shoulder. “Don’t push it, I’m still your Guardian after all.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it,” Akshi replied. “Um, I hate to be kind of a weirdo, but I _might_ have brought you over to my island before you woke up.”

Knuckles looked around. “Yeah, now that you mentioned it, I can sorta tell- there are fruit trees that I’ve never even seen before. And the pavement looks a lot less worn down, too.”

“Yeah,” Akshi said. “Sorry.” He looked down into the rose bushes, and just then he caught a strange glimmer.

“Don’t sweat it,” Knuckles said. “Saves me a hike.”

“Well, lemme show you around… well, show you what _used_ to exist on Angel Island,” Akshi said. “Point in whatever direction seems interesting.”

Knuckles thought for a moment before pointing towards a nearby clearing. “That way.”

As Knuckles ran ahead, Akshi stepped over to the bush and fished out a small rock. As he held it up, he noticed the pink hue and the jagged triangular shape. He looked back to the purple roses and smiled as he felt the familiar warmth eminating from the quartz.

“Are you coming?” Knuckles called from a distance. 

"Yeah, don't wait up for me," the bird said. He smiled, grabbing a strand of ivy and flicking it into a leather chord. He carefully hung the stone around his neck and chuckled before following the echidna. _I guess our fates will be crossing again soon,_ he thought.

_Very soon._

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, a link to my deviantart is posted below.
> 
> https://www.deviantart.com/monochromayhem


End file.
